The Handsome Men
by Person With Many Aliases
Summary: OneShot Compilation. The Tales and Travails of American Girls living in a Big, Bad World.
1. White Pearl: Russian Roulette

"Gunslinger Girl" Series property of Aida Yu

Original Characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

Indiscrete References are to their likewise respective properties.

Story dedicated to Sheo Darren: All around hip guy, good-natured, and good writer. It was thanks to his literary skills that he caught my attention, and eventually drew me into the absolutely wonderful idea of creating adorable killing machines, though not only that (but that's a story for another time). It took me a while to realize that Liesel and Meir were other Original Characters, though.

(I'm not a gun-nut, so if I happen to accidentally pick the worst weapon to use… well… bear with it.)

* * *

_She was tired of the beer bottles that smashed onto her head, her father's rude shouts, night and days without food while her supposed guardian slothed about on a couch or disappeared for days on end outside. Tired of blows to her body, palms open or closed. Tired of the butt of her father's beloved gun smashing down on her for the slightest thing, tired of eternal waft of alcohol floating in the air. Dirty mirrors and dirty floors, aged wood and blood stains and puke that never got cleaned up._

_She was so sick of it all. She would do anything to get rid of it all._

_Her father was drunk enough to forget to lock the drawer that held his beloved gun._

_"I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU!" She screamed as she unloaded onto the sleeping man's head, the kick of the cannon nearly ripping her arms off. She had to re-aim for valuable eternity-seconds, after the gun's aim flew up into the air with every blast._

_Fireworks lit the room; drum rolls announced the death of the king. Ding-dong, the witch is dead, the wicked old witch is dead._

_She threw up onto the ground after she realized what she had done._

_No! No! It was all wrong! This wasn't supposed to happen. Did she hate the wrong thing? She couldn't survive without him!_

_She was just so tired of this sort of living…_

_She mumbled and she shivered, and she sobbed as she felt her mouth wrap around the heated barrel of the gun that she pointed at herself._

_There were no such things as second-chances, but anything was better than this._

_She pulled the trigger-_

"**You and I, we're both sick! The only time we feel alive is when we put our lives on the line, it's a sad reality, but we people will never be satisfied. We'll always be seeking a higher rush!"**

* * *

**Person With Many Aliases Presents:**

"**Russian Roulette"**

**A Gunslinger Girls Fanfiction**

* * *

She blinked once.

Twice.

She realized she had fallen asleep at the range again. She was even still standing stock-straight, arms ahead of her, pointing her cold gun at the Swiss-cheesed target several meters away. She dropped her stance for a couple of minutes to relax the sore (fake) muscles. Giving a wide-jawed yawn, she rubbed the grit and dirt out of the corners of her green eyes. After running a hand to brush away brown hair that should have been by her shoulders, and not all over her face, she slid another clip into her gun and continued firing at the target.

The smell of smoke in the morning wasn't too bad, really.

Well, Mr. Leon said not to stop firing until he returned.

A man entered the range, armed with a paper bag and his eternally, abominably, inhuman grin that always seemed to take up two thirds of his face. He was built lean, like any martial-artist. He should have been anyways. He was Chinese, right from his eyes down to the long ponytail that fell down from the base of his head. He always dressed dark. Dark cloth jacket, dark jeans, and dark gloves.

"Yo. Back. You can stop now, Matilda."

She lowered her gun and bowed deeply at the man, "Mr. Leon. I've been at this range as long as you instructed me to."

"It's a nice morning, isn't it?" Leon continued to grin, as he looked into the sky though his round glasses.

"It is."

"I got some coffee for you."

Matilda gratefully accepted the paper cup with both hands from Leon's outstretched own, and sipped for a little while. Sooner or later, though, her eyes eventually drew themselves up to the large revolver that rested, holstered in front of Leon's belly.

"You want this, don't you?" Leon always taunted, as he rested a hand on the black handle.

"…It's _Mine_." Matilda growled. That was the only phrase she could ever say with any sense of possessiveness, without fear of reprisal from her Handler. She never remembered exactly when or how she got it but she knew, down to whatever she could call her soul, that the she was the true owner of that weapon.

Leon pulled out the veritable Handcannon, and spun it a few time by its trigger-guard. "You're not ready for it yet. What's the score?"

"…Three hundred."

"And what did we promise?"

"…Five hundred." Matilda conceded to mutter.

"Then you only have two hundred more to go before you can have your dear gun back." Leon grinned.

"Yes, Mr. Leon." Matilda bowed again.

"Good soldier. You make me proud that we're Handsome White Pearl. Come on, girl. Let's go. We've got a job today." Leon already was walking off.

Matilda looked at her own jacket for a few seconds. It was similar to Leon's except hers was too many sizes too many. It reached down to her knees, and she had to roll back the sleeve a bit to keep her hands free. Brushing off some more dust off herself, Matilda followed after her mentor.

* * *

Matilda had just enough time to change, eat, and stock and arm herself before she piled her 9-year-old self into a black van with Leon.

"What are we supposed to do, Mr. Leon?"

"You know Senator Thunderstone? Him. We're going to kill him."

"Um… isn't he part of our government?"

"Well, yeah. But the guys really in charge decided his unfriendly Israeli policies are no good, so we're taking him out."

"Mr. Leon, I heard he has been receiving death threats."

"I sent them."

"…You? Why? Doesn't it compromise our safety?"

Somehow, Leon's grin only got more wide and predatory, "Oh, but think of the fun. Us people, Matilda, we can't have any fun being sneaky. We feel the most alive feeling the heat of lead flying past us, our lives always being gambled with theirs… don't you feel more alive when you play that way, Matilda?"

_-mumbled and she shivered, and she sobbed as she felt her mouth wrap around the heated barrel-_

"I think so, Mr. Leon."

The Chinese man leaned back slightly and pushed his glasses upwards, letting the sunlight bounce of the glass, "Besides, it means more people for you to kill. Then you'd be able to finish your final two hundred faster."

Matilda mentally agreed while she looked out of the tinted windows at the sky. "Mr. Leon?"

"Yeah?"

"Are there other children out there? Other children that are… cyborged and conditioned like me? I know there are my friends in Handsome Red and Handsome Purple…"

"Sure. I know that there's an Israeli group, Childville, which has about two kids. I think that's actually part of the reason why we're killing that senator. Then there's that Italian Social Welfare Agency. Those guy's have the most teams."

"Will I have any more friends soon?" Matilda weakly suggested. Leon pushed up his glasses again.

"It depends on how much the American Government likes up. So far we're trying to get enough funding and a kid to start building a Handsome Blue."

By then, the van slowed by the parking lot of the golf field. "Hey, you two, deploy." The driver commanded.

Handsome White Pearl did as he requested. Time was always of the essence.

But that didn't mean you should spend what you could enjoying yourself.

* * *

Two men in suits, sunglasses, and earpieces were guarding a caddy path that led to hole seven. There, Senator Thunderstone was deeply involved in his weekly golfing practices, and as long as he was there, nobody else was going to be.

One of the men hummed in surprised before calling his companion and jerking his head towards an approaching caddy. Stepping into the dirt road, one of the suits raised their arms, halting the driving occupants.

The driver was a Chinese guy with glasses and a grin like he was thinking something funny to himself. In the seat next to him was a brunette 9-year-old. She was wearing a small blouse, a plaid skirt, and a way too huge jacket for her.

"Sorry. This area is closed off. Turn around and head back."

"Really? Why?" The Chinese guy grinned.

"Because."

"Oh." The Chinese guy turned to the girl who was sitting patiently, "Matilda. Would you please be a dear?"

"Yes, Mr. Leon."

Matilda straightened up and held out her arms towards the two men. The suits gave a look of confusion, before the sounds of springs and sliding metal.

Two SIG P228 slid out of her sleeves and into the girl's hands.

"Holy sh-"

Fireworks lit the sky; drum rolls announced the death of the two valiant soldiers. One bullet smashed through the black lens and exited out the other side of the man's head. The other plunged through the warm neck and severed the spine, red runnels pouring out the man's neck.

"Let's go Matilda."

A wrist motion reset the mechanisms, and the guns were pulled back into the sleeves.

"Yes, Mr. Leon."

* * *

Steve Thunderstone was about to putt the golf ball into the hole in audience of the suits around him when they all heard a loud whine of a small engine and gunfire. As the bodyguard quickly pushed the senator behind them while drawing out their guns they watched in surreal horror as a caddy flew over a low hill. A girl was holding two guns and shooting left and right at the suits that were interspersed along the distance between them and the senator. The man driving was also carrying a gigantic revolver, grinning like a fucking psycho out of hell, and slamming a round here and there like he was in a carnival game.

"Go! Go!" The bodyguards shouted at Thunderstone while they shoved him into one of the nearby caddies of their own. Another one took off with the cart that held the target of assassination, while the remaining men removed their handguns to open up at the approaching pair.

Between Leon and Matilda, they didn't last for much longer than five seconds. As Handsome White Pearl drove past the pile of corpses, Matilda dropped the empty clips from her guns and slammed them into a fresh pair that was tied to her thighs, under her skirt.

The ensuing caddy chase was a rather odd sight, in the perception of Leon, and perhaps Matilda since he trained her. But in the end, they managed to kill the men in the caddy that was protecting the other one holding Thunderstone, leaving it smoking behind them.

As the two golf-carts arrived on the other side of the golf pitch, there laid an auxiliary car park, which specially held the senator's guarded car.

"Oi! Matilda! That car's probably bullet proofed! Get him now!"

"Yes, Mr. Leon-"

She fired several times at the small wheel that supported the Senator's caddy. A bullet smashed through the rubber and metal, and the whole thing was knocked off, snapping the axel. The entire cart fell on its side and slid to a halt in front of the car park.

The a gashed Thunderstone feebly pulled himself up out of the fallen vehicle, but it was still a chicken shoot, as Handsome White Pearl walked over and unloaded several shots into his emerging chest, rocking him back and forth while his face contorted in unbelievable pain, before he fell back into the caddy.

Leon grinned again, before pulling out a cell-phone.

"Yo. This is Handsome White Pearl. He's dead. Yes I'm sure, but we made a bit of a mess again. We'll leave the lie weaving to you. Later."

Leon turned back to his child, "Hey, Matilda. We're gonna wait here until they pick us up."

"Yes, Mr. Leo-" Matilda began before she turned to look past her master in a look of horror.

The driver for the senator's car was unaccounted for. He was now emerging from behind the open trunk of the car with an M4 Carbine, and aiming for Mr. Leon's back.

She had no time to think. She just ran and shoved Mr. Leon out of the way and raised her arms to cover her head and body-

* * *

Leon and some others stood on the other side of the one-sided mirror, watching the operation.

"So you just let her soak up nearly the entire clip of rifle rounds before you just laugh a bit and killed the last man at your leisure? That's totally unacceptable!"

"Why? She's my soldier, and we both know the risks. It's what Handsome White Pearl lives for."

The man arguing with Leon wanted more than ever to smash his face into Leon's stupid grin. "Handsome White Pearl our only attacking team right now, and it's only meant for deep penetration maneuvers! You just can't let her take abuse like that! The reconditioning and repairs take away from her shelf-life!"

"So what? People like us don't care for living forever! We got to live on the edge, and if a few bullets for Matilda and me is gonna be the price, we'll pay it! Live fast, die young! That's how we feel alive…"

"That's how YOU feel alive! The only reason why she's going to end up the same way is because she's imprinting your ideals onto herself!"

"That's a good soldier."

"Why you little-"

Another voice interrupted.

"It is not your place to judge Leon's training method or philosophy. However, it is my place as the head of this group to cast a warning. You are not to use Matilda like some gun-toting shield. You are to keep the Cyborg in Handsome White Pearl at full capacity as long as possible, or the consequences will be high. I do not want to hear an incident like this ever again. Do I make myself clear?"

"I understand completely sir, and will take that as an order."

"Good. Dismissed."

* * *

Matilda blinked the grim out of her eyes as she lay in the medical ward.

"It's a nice morning, isn't it Matilda?"

She turned to see that familiar grin and a cup of coffee.

"Mr. Leon… I'm sorry…"

"Why?"

"I didn't notice the last man fast enough… I should have got there faster. I could have hit the man… but I just got myself hurt and you nearly killed." She was on the brink of tears.

She nearly failed Mr. Leon.

A hand comfortingly patted her head. "Ah, you're still alive. That's the important bit. A bit of training, and you'll probably never make that mistake again."

"You think so…?"

"Eh…" Leon shrugged, "Anyways, I got the score from the news."

"Really?"

"You killed 19 men."

"That's nice."

"That leaves 181 points left to go." Leon said as he stood up. Giving a quick kiss to the forehead, he told her to get some sleep, and that he'd be back tomorrow.

So Matilda dreamt. Dreamt the same dream she always had.

* * *

_Silence. The girl's eyes shot open in shock and she looked at the gun. She pulled the trigger several more times, but a hollow click was the only thing that came out._

_And she shot him so many times…why now…_

_"You know, that gun only holds six bullets." A voice from behind taunted. She turned around to see an open window in the living room. In front of it a shadow and a grin sat on the couch._

_"Who…who are you…"_

_"Who knows…can I see that?" The man held out a hand. She didn't know why, but she easily gave the revolver to him._

_"Nice… a real handcannon…hey girl, you like do die?"_

_"I…I hate it here!"_

_"Then we're similar. Do you want to play a game for similar people like us?"_

_There was a bit of a weak nod._

_"Good girl. Go to where you found this gun. There should be another bullet there. Take only one."_

_She went and returned quickly, holding a copper round that was large in her hand._

_The man took the bullet and put it into one of the holes in the gun, spun it, and snapped the barrel bit into the handcannon._

_"How about it, kid? If you win, you can do whatever you want."_

_"…If I lose?"_

_"If you lose, then I want you to work for me."_

_"…Okay…"_

_"Follow after me."_

_To her somewhat horror, the man pulled the hammer back and pointed the gun to his head. Without even blinking, he pulled the trigger._

_Silence._

_He handed the gun to her._

_"Your turn."_

_He was patient, letting her take as long as she need to gather the courage to pull the trigger to her head. He on the other hand, wasted no time testing his luck._

_Once, twice, thrise, four times, the gun hit empty. It was the man's turn again._

_Silence._

_"I win." The man grinned._

_Shaking hands moved to the gun. "I…I'm scared. I don't like to shot myself in the head."_

_"You can shoot yourself in the stomach then."_

_"But… I'm going to die! How am I going to work for you?"_

_"I'll bring you back to life. I'll take you away to a place where you can be of use."_

_"Promise?"_

_"I promise."_

_She tried to waste not time. But the feeling of the steel through the cloth onto her belly was frightening._

_Fireworks. Drum rolls. She fell to the ground in a pool of fast departing blood. As she drowned and breathed, she turned a blurring eye up to the shadow above her._

_The grin consumed her. She was no more._

* * *

**She has a mechanical body. However, she is still an adolescent child.**

**Russian Roulette: End**

* * *

Trivial Trivia:

- Ever since Social Welfare Agency's pioneering of mechanical bodies, most of the richer nations of the world have picked up enhancement variants, or parallel organizations. The US's response to Childville and SWA is their own mechanical body unit, codenamed "The Handsome Men" after an underground comic. In the comics, there are 9 Handsome Men, thus ultimately; there will be 9 Mechanical Units. They plan to have each Handsome Man specialize in certain fields:

Handsome Red: Long Range Sniper Unit.

Handsome White Pearl: Deep Penetration Unit.

Handsome Purple: Heavy Ordinance Unit.

Handsome Dead and Handsome Pink: Covert Operations Unit.

Handsome Gold, Handsome Blue, and Handsome Light Brown: Main Attack Unit.

Handsome Black: Mechanical Advancement Unit.

- Matilda's sleeve concealed guns are based off Kugashira Bunji's technique in the Gungrave anime. Episode 20 showcases the technique best.

-Matilda's reloading technique is based off Brandon Heat's technique in the Gungrave anime, and Lara Croft's technique in the first Tomb Raider movie.


	2. Red: Playing God

"Gunslinger Girl" Series property of Aida Yu

Original Characters property of author Person With Many Aliases

A/N: Even though this was obviously a One-Shot, everybody kept asking for more, so I concede. I'll do one on each Handsome team, and see if the audience interest is still there on the way through. Still not completely sure about guns, so again, if I screw up. Well, whatever.

* * *

_She prayed it would stop one day. But they day never seemed to come. She couldn't even remember if she had a family. All she saw now was the bed in the dark room, the video camera, and the hands everywhere that touched her naked body._

_They made it a business out of farming her body to greedy eyes on the internet. They would receive replies back from interested parties._

"_can u fuck her while shes high? thx."_

"_Tie her up and whip her till there's blood."_

"_try it up d ass, lol"_

_She wasn't sure when it would stop._

_She prayed it would stop one day, whenever her mouth wasn't stuffed with the men's semen. It came one day._

_A police sting. They finally found the child porn and prostitution ring hideout. They barged in. They didn't expect the criminals to protect their business so fiercely. A Gunfight._

_She happened to be in the middle of it._

_She half-woke up, clinging to a worthless life by her fingernails in a hospital bed. Two men above her. She could only remember the determined hard line of his mouth._

"_You sure you want this one?"_

_"I know this is the one."_

**It is mine to avenge; I will repay… - Deuteronomy 32:35**

* * *

**Person With Many Aliases presents:**

"**Playing God"**

**A Gunslinger Girl Fanfiction**

* * *

She often wondered what the hell was up with her name. She often wondered what the hell Jose was on when he thought up the name.

Jihad.

What sort of fucking retard decided 'Jihad' was a usable name? Sure it was exotic, and she loved it, since Jose was the one who gave her her name.

But the other girls had perfectly normal names. Matilda, Janie, and that new girl in the new Handsome Blue team… whatever it was. She was still going through the ropes, so the original three girls hadn't had time yet to sit down and talk with her.

But seriously, now she was called Jihad of all things. In America of all places. Way to fucking go, Jose, just name me after the first thing that comes to mind when you put "Middle East" and "Terrorist" together. She asked him once why that for a name. 'I thought it sounded interesting' was the answer.

Fucking retard.

"You missed completely."

Jihad winced as she looked through the scope at the mostly unharmed cardboard man. It wasn't even that far…

"You were distracted again, weren't you?"

Damn, Jose could look scary when he wanted to, even if he was huggable most of the time. Dark hair and dark eyes and a grim dark look made Jihad sweat, or at least want to sweat. She wasn't sure if there were any sweat glands left in her body after the mechanization. She gave a slightly fearful, slightly worried look up at her Handler.

"S-sorry Jose! I'll do better!"

Jose sort of stared, but eventually warmed up in his usual "Forgive-all" grin. "Don't worry, I'm sure you'll get it next time." He ruffled her hair.

Jihad was slightly miffed. She wasn't sure whether to squeal in joy at the touch, or get annoyed at being treated like a spoiled little girl… a **normal** spoiled little girl.

"Anyways, again." Jose commanded, looking through his binoculars.

She made sure to actually be looking through scope this time.

Boom. Headshot.

"Again."

Boom. Headshot.

"Again!"

Boom. Headshot.

"Again!"

Click.

Jose lowered his viewing glass. He wiped his forehead at the afternoon sun, and shrugged. "This is a good time to stop for today. Go get yourself cleaned up. I don't like my girl smelling like gun-oil and dirt all day."

"Um… okay."

That was that. Jihad headed back to the dorms, stripped and showered said smells away as fast as possible. She then shoved herself into her clothing at about the same speed, looking in the mirror so she could be sure she would be presentable.

Army Camo. That was all she could bear to wear. Anything patterned like the army, tailor-made to her size. Tough jackets, baggy pants, leather boots, colors of deserts and forests and urban. Short brown hair with horrendous bangs (Jose understood why), and brown eyes. She glared at her 11-year-old cuteness.

After being a fucking child-whore (She really should stop swearing. It only reminded her of the past. Fuck the past), for God knows how long, the last thing she needed was to be cute, or to dress cute. She wanted to dress like she could kill.

She still looked cute. Cute little child soldier. Goddamn.

"Oh, hello Jihad." Came the familiar voice. Jihad turned around to see her friend in Handsome White Pearl, Matilda. The two of them bunked together in the same room. Good girl, Matilda was, even if she was just ever slightly nutty. It was a general consensus that White Pearl was the nuttiest of them so far, with their fucked up philosophy of Live Fast, Die Young.

"Oh, hey Matilda! Um… how's it going?"

"Oh, very good! I think my score's down to 150 now!"

"Hey, pretty good!"

Smiles around. Eventually Jihad moved to sit by the table in the middle of the dorm room. Matilda decided to keep standing.

"Did you hear, Jihad?"

"Hear what?"

"I think the two of us are going out on a job together today."

"Really? What about Janie?"

"I think it's too heavy for her style."

"It's always that."

There was a lull for a while.

"Jihad?"

"Hmmm?"

"Why do you try to purposely dislike Mr. Joseph?"

"Matilda, I don't 'puposely' dislike Jose. I just don't like him."

"If you didn't, you wouldn't have to try to be mean to him."

"What makes you think I'm only trying!"

"I don't know. It's just that even though Mr. Joseph gives you presents and treats, you always try to look mean at him and pick fights, even though he's to forgiving to start an argument. But whenever he gets serious, you always become… submissive?"

"Ugh, god, Matilda, don't use that word around me." Jihad groaned before she leaned into the table.

"Sorry."

Another lull. Jihad filled it up this time.

"…I don't want to be cute…" She mumbled into her folded arms.

"Oh. You dislike him being kind?"

"It's not that… part of me hates the feeling of being coddled and being a pretty princess. Another part loves actually being coddled and being a princess… It confuses me sometimes…"

"Don't worry. I'm sure you'll figure it all out. It's not like our shelf-life is that short."

"Suppose so."

It was about that time that Matilda's handler poked his grin through the door, since the grin was his face practically. "Matildaaa."

"Yes, Mr. Leon?"

"Time to kill. Handsome Red is accompanying us as well."

"Okay."

* * *

They were purposely going for overkill today; make a big show of it. Some Mob Boss thought he was going to get away with it. He already bailed, and he was pompously going to strut around with that limousine of his. Prick. The Handsome Men were going to send a lead love letter from the US government to the Mafia about matters of big shots thinking of getting away.

Handsome Red was going in with a M107 Anti-Materials Gun. The thing was designed to use ammo that put holes in metal, not speaking even of what would happen of normal flesh. Handsome White Pearl was on stand-by to ensure the straggler numbers were low enough to ensure only eyewitnesses, not retaliation.

For the most part, Handsome Red had free reign on landing whatever hell it wished.

Jihad absorbed this information, while the assembled team roared down the highway inside a black van. She wondered what was with the freedom.

"Jihad?" Jose called out.

She turned up from the various probabilities of why to look at her handler that looked absolutely stunning in his black business suit. "Yes?"

"…When you go there, don't worry about the clean up. Don't worry about what I think. Just go wild."

"…Okay?"

"Good."

Apparently that was all, as Jose turned his head back out the window, thoughtful about something.

Now Jihad was really wondering what the fuck the freedom was all about.

Handsome Red settled itself on a rooftop that commanded a pretty good portion of the main street of the city. If the strutting Mob Boss bastard was going to strut, he would strut here.

The black Limo appeared like clockwork far away, down on the streets. A small row of smaller cars behind him served transport for the man's bodyguards.

Jihad snorted. She was allowed to go wild, and Matilda was handling the enemy numbers. She was going wild.

Slamming a black magazine into the underside of her rifle, Jihad pulled back on the Bolt to load the first round into the chamber. She looked through the scope, gave a little evil smile to herself, as she looked down at the car like it was an ant under a magnifying glass. She loved being the sniper. She could reach out and touch anything she wanted like this. She felt almost beyond human sometimes before she took her first shot.

Thunder, a bolt of lead lightning. The Limousine front crumpled inwards, destroying the engine. As the Limo screeched to a halt, a bodyguard car or two slammed into the backside of the Limo.

Jihad did her best from laughing aloud at the stupidity of the cars. She could imagine them freaking out right now. She took aim for the limo driver first, though the black glass. The window shattered in an explosion of blood.

From there, she took a few potshots at the roof of the Limo. She probably wouldn't hit the Boss, but she'd spook him up, as he'd watch his bodyguards inside his car explode.

Men were starting to pour out of the other cars by then, wielding automatics and semi automatics of various sizes. Matilda was immediately out, striding confidently sideways while unloading her two pistols into the crowd with precision aim. Jihad helped her from her vantage point, ripping men apart with her trigger finger, taking out men out of Matilda's vision that could present a threat to her.

By then Jose's voice cut in with something very important. "The target is emerging."

The Mobser kicked open the door and started waddling away, towards another car that worked.

Seeing that fat hulking form, Jihad grimaced. The grimace turned into a frown, the frown into something hateful. Something snapped inside Jihad.

She could immediately envision the fat man in another place. That fat, ugly man. Fat, ugly pedophile. Fat. Ugly. Crouching over a bed naked. Laughing to himself. Fat, and ugly and fucking. Tears, little girls. Fat, ugly pedophile with his fat ugly hands groping naked girls. Fat, ugly, thinking he had the money to do whatever he liked, to taste whatever he wanted.

The signs were all there. Jihad saw red.

She reached out and ripped the man's legs out from under him. She took careful aim for the head.

Boom. Headshot.

Boom. Headshot.

Boom. Headshot.

Boom. Pulpy Headshot.

Boom…

She hissed hatred at that form that jerked back and forth from the rounds she was thrusting into his body. She kept firing until she wasted the entire clip.

Jose didn't interrupt her.

* * *

It was nighttime. Matilda went to the firing range again in one of Leon's "shoot all night" drills. Jose took Jihad out for a night in a city for a little celebration.

Jose was smart enough to call the thing a "trip", and not let slip his stupid adult mouth as a "date". Jihad hated that word. It implied the ulterior motive for sex.

They had ice-cream. Though Jihad secretly liked Cookies and Cream, Vanilla, Chocolate, and Strawberry, she didn't like being cute. She figured that Cappuccino flavor was a flavor that implied strong.

She found out it actually implied complete and utter shit.

Jose, being the sweet bastard he was, purposely ordered those jumbo-sized ice creams with all her favorite flavors. So when Jihad finally made that face for the umpteenth time while trying to lick that diarrhea colored sweet, he did that "Do you want mine? I don't really mind, it's not my favorite flavor" act.

Bastard.

After a while, Jihad spoke.

"Jose?"

"Yes?"

"Your purposely let me go berserk. He was a pedophile as well as a mobster, wasn't he? You knew I was going to make his death messy."

"Yes…"

"So you used my past against me." She frowned. She was tempted to call him a Fucker.

"It wasn't just that."

"Oh really."

"Yes. You know I was there when you were first in the hospital. I was told first thing about your past history. I know how much you hate those sorts of people. When I first heard of this job, I knew you were the only one who should have been allowed to handle his death. Your way of finally striking back at those sorts of people who tormented you before. Revenge."

Jihad gaped for a while. Then tried to shrug. "Well… whatever."

She walked off first, letting Jose follow after her.

Jose was such a bastard. Sweet bastard. Jihad loved him.

* * *

**Jihad is Struggle. Jihad is Holy War. Jihad is Divine Revenge.**

**Playing God: End**

* * *

A/N: I've finally gone off the deep end this time. Now I'm dabbling in possibly offensive material. Great. It's really creepy the stuff I make up when I want to write something dark. And this is only the second dark thing I've written, and the first was the other Gunslinger Girl fiction. I'm crazy.

If I get heavily flamed or something, I probably deserve it. What sort of fucking retard decides "Jihad" is a usable name?

Trivial Trivia:

- Ever since Social Welfare Agency's pioneering of mechanical bodies, most of the richer nations of the world have picked up enhancement variants, or parallel organizations. The US's response to Childville and SWA is their own mechanical body unit, codenamed "The Handsome Men" after an underground comic. In the comics, there are 9 Handsome Men, thus ultimately; there will be 9 Mechanical Units. They plan to have each Handsome Man specialize in certain fields:

Handsome Red: Long Range Sniper Unit.

Handsome White Pearl: Deep Penetration Unit.

Handsome Purple: Heavy Ordinance Unit.

Handsome Dead and Handsome Pink: Covert Operations Unit.

Handsome Gold, Handsome Blue, and Handsome Light Brown: Main Attack Unit.

Handsome Black: Mechanical Advancement Unit.


	3. Purple: Super Hero

"Gunslinger Girl" series property of Yu Aida.

Original Characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

A/N: Listened to Sintendo's advice. Compiled the previous two one-shots along with the new third one.

Handsome Purple looks like a particularly tough one to write. Lack of inspiration?

Eitherway, here I am again writing One-shots. I suppose they're easier to write or something. One more time: Not a gun nut. We'll see what the future brings.

Finally, about the "Jose" question posed by certain reviewers of Playing God, if you read the conversation between Matilda and Jihad carefully, you'll see it. If you can't see it, I'll just stick an answer at the bottom of this story.

* * *

_She was never really sure where she came from._

_From the dawn of time, she was the wheel chair bound girl in the forgotten corner of the forgotten orphanage of somewhere in the middle of nowhere._

_No family, no friends. Just some caretakers that made sure she was alive when they came by the next time._

_She sat, and she sat._

_Until that glorious day she was adopted into medical agency that needed volunteering children to try out their new "Rehabilitative Conditioning."_

_She cried tears of Joy._

_She was Reborn…_

**Janie's got a gun… Whole world's come Undone…**

* * *

**Person With Many Aliases Presents:**

"**Super Hero"**

**A Gunslinger Girl Fanfiction**

* * *

She wished for Liam to look at her more. But he always seemed more concerned about the smoking mess she made at the far end of the field. She'd always work harder, shoot faster, kill better, but it never got her any closer to Liam.

She knew almost everything about her Handler. Just standing around him long enough, all the little details came out.

Liam was a man who came from the southern states of America. Around him, he was jokingly named "The War Veteran". It was true, he was probably the oldest of the Handlers, but the thick gray beard and packed muscles, plus his knowledge proved him a quickly respected senior. He was a front-line war hero, though. He wasn't exactly happy when he was put in Handsome Purple, a team whose weapons primarily put them on the second line for support. Past that, the other thing was the name he gave her, Janie. Apparently he was uninspired and picked a name from an Aerosmith Song one day.

For the most part, Janie was the most normally dressed and plainest looking of the "Original Handsome Three". She was the classic cherub: blonde haired, blue eyed, pink sundress, and white shoes. Of course, most adorable children came with teddy bears or the like, not grenade launchers.

"Liam! I got all the targets!" She grinned. Each was dead on! How about that?

"Hmph. Am I supposed to be impressed? Bah! Need I remind you where my medals are from! Those Guerillas were everywhere, unlike your targets sticking their paper asses out in the air! Damn Vietcong… everywhere… either way, what is the government thinking? Like children with guns… absurd. Janie, go through the machine gun drills.

"Yes!"

"Yes, sir." He corrected.

"Yes, sir!"

After the targets were recycled, Liam watched blankly at the girl rip through the paperboards perfectly as always. He eventually got bored, and knew there was a debriefing soon.

"Janie. Keep shooting. I'll be back."

"Yes, sir!"

Standing up, he smoothed out his white suit before grabbing his cane, which had a handle shaped exactly like Walther gun. He wasn't disabled or anything like that, but it went with the suit.

* * *

Liam was amused at the speed the Handsome Men were being armed. It only felt like yesterday that Leon, Joseph and himself were the only ones. Now they had a fully outfitted Attack Unit like they wanted (Handsome Blue, Gold, and Light Brown), and they were already training another two for Covert Ops.

_Hmph, all this money being poured in to make super soldiers with state of the art weapons. That will never be a substitute for real soldiers-_

"Good looks like everyone's here." The final man entered the conference room. He was bald, a little younger than Liam himself, but he was named "Mr. Superior" for a reason.

"So, what's it this time?" Somebody asked. Mr. Superior nodded to a man next to a laptop and projector.

"Unfortunately, it appears the rumors are true. Over time, the trail made by money laundering activities from various organized crime groups show that several of these criminal elements are funding large amounts of money to build a high-tech mercenary organization that leases their hitmen to buyers across the world."

There were murmurs of concern around the table, before the slide moved again to show a symbol. It appeared to be two geometric shapes reminiscent to a side view of a grinning bat, the to figures joining together to form a single four-winged creature.

"From what we've gathered, this new organization is calling itself "kNIGHTS", and is working under this logo. Apart from that, we're not sure how far they're along. We do know that for the past several weeks, there have been transactions of seed money from mafia patrons to the kNIGHTs at various places around the country. In fact, I believe that Handsome White Pearl is tailing one of patrons right now…"

In perfect timing, the phone rang. Mr. Superior put it on speaker.

* * *

"Superior. This is White Pearl." Leon's sneering voice came through.

"Yes?"

"Looks like we found the meeting place. They scoped it out, and left, but I think they'll be back at night. It's at a warehouse by an airstrip."

"Do you know the address?"

"Of course."

"Janie, you can stop now."

The girl did as she was told, and as the noise stopped, she turned a curious eye to her Handler.

"Suit up. We're going out to kill bad guys."

"Yay!"

"Yes, Sir." He corrected once more.

"I mean- Yes, Sir!"

* * *

Handsome Purple for the most part, was only concerned with softening up the targets. Keeping the money intact and a person alive to interrogate was somebody else's problem. Toss a few grenades in to stun them, then secure the outside of the warehouse, ensuring to "give any runners extra assholes", as Liam so clearly put it.

"Um… Liam?"

"Yes?"

"I… uh… I just wanted to say I'll do my best!"

"I expect nothing from the best from you all the time anyways. You don't need to remind me."

Janie drooped at the comment. Liam didn't bother noticing. "Just do your job."

"Yes, Sir…"

* * *

The clouds covered the moon that night, leaving the only illumination from the lamps that ringed the large warehouse. Good thing for the gift of night vision. The Handsome Men had already scoured the perimeter and were slowly approaching the warehouse. For Handsome Purple, they were already on the roof of a building on the opposite side of the airstrip, and commanded the entire surrounding with Handsome Red. Janie's weaponry came in two tonight. On one hand, she carried the classic "Thumper", the M79 Grenade Launcher, with several rounds to boot. However, what she was setting on the edge of the building was a real pride and joy: the M240G. The word "machine gun" and "100 rounds per minute" did not require much more for the imagination. After pulling the belt of ammo into the feed, Janie quietly turned to her Handler.

"Done."

"Don't shoot yet. I'm waiting for a go ahead."

"Wow… that's a lot of cars for a meeting."

"Leave those to Handsome Red… wait… Janie, showtime."

The girl quickly pulled out the grenade launcher, and with a loud flash, the round fly and smashed into a window. By the time there was an explosion, shattering glass, and disappearing lights, Janie was already reloaded and had already fired a second into the building, scoring more screams. Jihad on her rifle beside her helped add to the chaos by firing into each car's gas tank, creating more large explosions. All the while, the others were entering the building, with sounds of gunfire, and some staggered retaliation. The fight seemed one-sided though, as Liam watched through the binoculars and saw something.

"Janie. Runners. Give them extra assholes."

The girl immediately dropped her first weapon and rushed to shoulder her larger instrument of death. In moments, she was making the ground explode around the escaping men, leaving them to launch through the air in every which way. More bad guys seemed to be escaping with every second, and Janie was always there to enact justice with her amazing night vision and long-range projectiles, putting them all down.

It wasn't long before a cease-fire was shouted through a radio.

Mark another one down for the good guys.

* * *

After a quick once over, the Handsome Men left, their work done. Other departments would handle the investigation after the clean up.

For Janie, she was simply told to clean up and go to bed. There she lay in her bunk in the dark, untied hair left to stream out underneath her. Her mind was always the most restless at night.

Why did he never look back? What must she do to be good enough?

"Danny?" Janie spoke upwards. On the bunk above her, Danielle, from Handsome Blue stirred slightly.

"Hmmm…?"

"Does your Handler like you?"

"…Think so… probably not used to the idea of a Mechanical Body yet…something the matter?"

"Why doesn't Liam pay more attention to me? I don't like it…"

"He's probably too used to you."

"What… too used to me?"

"He probably thinks you'll be around forever… that's why he doesn't count his blessings."

"Really?"

"Yeah… like that Spiderman movie… after Spiderman quit, then everybody felt sorry… don't worry, he'll come around one day. Just don't do anything stupid."

"Like what?"

"I suppose you haven't heard that story about that girl in Italy? Elsa de Sica?"

* * *

**The good things are never missed, until they're gone.**

**Super Hero: End**

* * *

A/N: Seems weaker this time. The strength of the characters doesn't seem as great as the earlier too. Oh well. As you can see, I figured I needed at least one dysfunctional Team Relationship. Though Handsome White Peal seems to still take the cake in "Weirdest Relationship".

Trivial Trivia:

-All Handlers carry false aliases that they teach their Mechanical Body to recognize them by. Handsome Red seems to have taken this to a further level, as Jihad likes to identify "Joseph" with the nickname of the shorter "Jose".


	4. Dead: Halloween Night

"Gunslinger Girl" series property of Yu Aida.

Original characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

Indiscrete References property of their likewise respective properties.

A/N: Apparently, my word of "Should Write More This Summer" actually meant writing everything except my primary Naruto fic. Strange world.

* * *

_There were two things she prayed for in every Sunday._

_One was that God would heal her skin and eyes, so she could walk in the sunlight without an umbrella and sunglasses._

_The other was that she would live to the next Sunday without getting killed by Protestants._

_This Sunday, God showed his strange ways of answering prayers._

"_OUT CATHOLICS! OUT CATHOLICS! OUT CATHOLICS!" She heard them yell amidst the sounds of breaking stain-glass and battering wood. But she was in God's home, in her mother's safe arms. Doubly safe-_

_A grenade flew through the window._

_When she came to, she felt pain shoot up her arms and legs. She tried to scream, but couldn't. She then realized what was wrong._

_She was missing her lower jaw._

* * *

**I went to see the Devil… Now it's your turn.**

**Person With Many Aliases Presents:**

"**Halloween Night"**

**A Gunslinger Girl Fanfiction**

* * *

She quietly peered around the corner of the stairwell to see if the hallway was clear. It was all clear. In a moment, the pre-teenaged white form padded along quietly hall towards the room at the end. Clear this last one and head for the roof, and she'd win.

Unlike her sisters, she was explicitly lectured on how her kicking down the door was the last thing she should ever do. The door didn't squeak, luckily, as a portion of her sun-glassed eye took a quick look, before the rest of her rolled into the room.

Nothing except for a strip of blue cloth she was supposed to collect.

She wasn't stupid though. When it came to Krauser, he liked to prey on his victim's impatience. Taking a good look of the room, it suddenly hit her that even for an empty room it was way too quiet.

Making sure to draw her combat knife as indiscreetly as possible, she suddenly whirled around to face the presence behind her.

Gone.

Hissing through clenched teeth, she looked around frantically.

She didn't realize to look up until nearly too late.

Krauser's blade sank into the bare cement floor, only catching a bit of his child's cheek. He raised his blade at her. His body was a true testament of war, thickly muscled, with grim but living blue eyes and short blonde hair covered by his habitually worn beret. "Been a long time, comrade?"

She snorted, before one of her fingers went through motions.

(I went through four floors and wasted three hours making sure you weren't in every closet, toilet, and light bulb in the room. Give me a break.) Her fingers said.

He responded in kind with his European-tinged English. "Don't complain, Ash'ey. It's your choice how careful or how fast you do this exercise. In this team, you're going to be alone in the field as often as you are with me. You have to take responsibility for your actions-"

Krauser lunged forward with his knife. "Ash'ey" first jerked her head backwards to avoid the attack at her face, before jumping back to miss the swipe at her belly. Deciding to press, before her Handler had the time to recover, she moved in, using her smaller size to attack rapidly in lower directions, forcing Krauser to stoop. He was still too, good though. With a practiced hand, he easily clashed away each blow before grabbing her wrist, twisting her around to kick her to the ground in the back, scattering her own knife and sunglasses across the ground. Ash'ey rolled around onto her back in time to reach up and prevent the knife from being driven into her pink eye. The two struggled with the blade, before the younger of the two kicked her handler off, throwing him across the room. Ash'ey was already running out of the room with the blue cloth.

* * *

It wasn't too long after that Krauser slowly made his way to the roof, opening it casually to take in the bright sun and fresh air. Turning around, he spotted Ash'ey pressed against the wall of the covered stairwell entrance, using the small roof to protect her white skin from the light. She handed him the four colored cloths.

"Good work, Ash'ey. You rushed a bit at the end, though. Never treat these exercises as simply running as fast as you can from me."

(Sorry.)

"You dropped these." He simply replied, handing back her knife and sunglasses.

(Thank you.)

"Good. Now I want you to take ten laps with your current gear, then you training will be over."

She gave him that sort of look in the eye that went "Err, but Krauser…"

"What?"

(…My friends invited me to tea within the hour…)

Krauser sighed. It was sort of hard to find that fine line between raising a girl and fine-tuning a weapon. "Fine. Do what you can in the hour, have your tea, and then finish the rest. You will finish those ten laps, even if you have to do it at night. The choice is up to you."

Ash'ey easily gave her silent and resolute salute, symbol of respect, thanks, and knowing when to and when not to bargain.

* * *

"Ah, Ashley, you made it." Matilda noted lightly from her cup of tea.

"Yeah, we were afraid that crazy German drill instructor of yours would make you do a hundred push-ups on your hand or something!" Jihad laughed before sipping her cup of coffee.

It was a common joke amongst their peers that Handsome Dead could also be called Handsome European Import. Ashley was trucked in from Ireland in an intensive care unit, and her handler, Krauser, was recommended from Germany. The two bonded fairly well because of that.

Ashley sat down, and saw her friends gratefully already had a pen and paper on the table for her. Picking it up, she produced an answer.

KRAUSER IS STILL MAKING ME DO LAPS AFTER THIS.

"Ah! Jeez! That kills the party, don't it!"

I'VE GOTTEN USED TO IT. KRAUSER IS SOMEONE YOU HAVE TO GET USED TO MAKING ROOM FOR.

They decided to let it go and get on with the little peace they had in between jobs, eating cake, drinking tea, sharing gossip. For a moment it did almost feel like a tea party between little girls. Most of them were still quite intrigued with Ashley's existence as a Mechanical Body.

"Well, you have to forgive us. I don't think there are really any other Albino Mechanical Bodies in the world. It just nags me, does that mean you're still sensitive to sunlight?"

I'M NOT SURE. I DON'T LIKE THE FEELING OF THE SUNLIGHT ANYWAYS.

"Oh."

"Hey, Ashley. I guess it was always a bit awkward, but since we're all talking anyways, I've been wondering why you don't like to talk. You can talk right?"

She didn't actually write out an "um", but the look on her face obviously showed a bit of thought.

YOU DO KNOW THAT I'M A SURVIVOR OF AN ATTACK BY PROTESTANTS BECAUSE OF RELIGIOUS FEUDS IN IRELAND?

"Yeah?"

I LOST MY LOWER JAW THEN.

"Ouch."

I SEE NOW IT'S QUITE EASY TO REPLACE, BUT THIS NEW ONE… IT FEELS "UNCOMFORTABLE".

"Why not ask for a replacement then?"

IT ISN'T THAT SIMPLE FOR ME… I JUST CAN'T GET USED TO THIS FEELING OF THIS THING IN MY MOUTH TRYING TO BE SOMETHING IT'S NOT.

"Well, I suppose it doesn't bother us. You're a nice girl after all, huh? Plus it helps, since you're Handsome Dead."

Ashley shrugged and ate a bit of cake.

* * *

The conference of older men peered at the PowerPoint presentation, giving strange looks at the design portrayed.

"That's a hellvua an ugly cross."

"It's a design by a new cult that sprung up recently. Called… um, 'Church of True Path Salvation'."

"So what's the deal on them?"

"A few things. This church is highly radical, dangerous even. They're openly prejudiced against… anything not them, really. The second thing is recently, the city in which the main church is located; the Mayor's son there's gone missing. And you know, this cult for a while's been wanting official recognition from the Mayor as a religion, not as a band of misfits."

"So there's suspicion of this Church being behind the kidnapping?"

"Well, not in so many words. The Church openly denies being involved in any kidnapping, but some people see a connection."

"What else is with these cultists?"

"We suspect them secretly raising a private army from their elect members. There is also a strong suspicion of who they're being supplied arms and training by… you can guess by now."

"kNIGHTS?"

"Again, we don't know, but we have an opportunity to find out."

"Any other reason?"

"Unfortunately. The Mayor's brother is the Senator that backs us."

"Ah, one of those things."

"Yes. Eitherway, this cult is becoming extremely dangerous. We're sending Handsome Dead to clean up this mess."

* * *

The Tea Party was cut short, when Ashley was dragged off to suit up in dark clothing and get strapped down with an amazing number of knives of various varieties, shapes, sizes, and uses.

Traveling as they always did by that familiar black van, Krauser talked to her.

"You have three things to do, so this is your most complicated yet. You're to kill the upper echelon members of this Church, find if there's anything that connects this church to kNIGHTS, and find this boy."

He handed Ashley a picture. A blonde, cheerful smiling boy around her age.

"We think that these cultists have him. I want you to get him out of there alive."

(Since when did we start protecting people?)

"Never mind that… politics."

(I see. Krauser, do I still have to do those laps?)

"Yes. Diligence and determination are good things to learn."

Ashley gave him the look that for the most part translated to "Oh, COME ON!"

"Don't look at me that way."

(Sorry.)

* * *

Night fell.

The Church of True Path Salvation had converted an old church into a red tinted propaganda show. So much the better.

Outside, two corpses lay guarding the back door, their throats in two pieces.

Inside, in his office, High Inquisitor Abraham was preparing his notes for his late night sermon, which called for his loyal brethren to stand up to the illusions the modern church had created along with their so-called Jesus.

The air-con grating fell on it though. To Abraham's surprise, he suddenly found a girl crouched on his desk in front of him.

This was no ordinary girl though. Her pale flesh, her white hair, her glaring red eyes from out of the top of her sunglasses.

"Who-what are you!"

Ashley stuck a knife into his brain.

Unfortunately the commotion was enough for people outside to hear something was off. Ashley was already back into the air ducts when the men screamed.

"Abraham is dead! Our leader is dead!"

The whole church was up in a commotion. Obviously a knife in their savior's head meant something was up.

_Curious._ Ashley watched with intrigue as church members across the building began going into closets, passing out handguns to whoever was willing to avenge.

"We must avenge our lord and kill the demon that dare defile our cause!" Inquisitor Marcel shouted to his troop.

_Oh bother. Just kill anyone in a uniform._

With that Ashley escaped from the ducts, and hid in the shadows.

Soon enough comrades that only lost contact for even five minutes caught up, to their horror, to men with their bodies sliced. Throats, arteries, organs, every single lethal place from different angles.

They started to panic.

"What the fuck is it? What the hell's killing us?" Secretary Adrian hissed, pointing his gun down the hallways colored red by the stain glass windows. The ambience used to be pretty before, but now it just felt horrific. Too many shadows, too much red.

"Too much red" was his last thought, before Ashley fell from the rafters above, driving a knife through the back of his neck.

"There you are!" Another silhouette shouted down the hall at her. Pulling up Adrian's corpse with the handle of the blade stuck in his neck, the Secretary served as the Albino's shield, as bullets were fired into his body, trying to pierce through.

They must not have very good training. They should realize a shield is a shield, even if it is meaty.

Ashley raised her arm over Adrian's shoulder, and easily flicked knife in her aggressor's direction, falling him with a cry.

Ashley worked through this routine for most of the night, but as she passed by a closed room, she heard a banging from the other side.

"_Somebody! Help me! Let me out!"_

It was annoying at times, since she wouldn't talk. She had no idea how to convey to the person on the other side that she was going to kick down the door. She had to give knock the door a couple times with her foot lightly in order to give off that she was knocking down, before she actually use all her force to blow the wood off its hinges.

Inside, backed up against the wall on the other side was the blonde boy Ashley was told to get out of the building alive. He sure didn't look cheerful, though.

But then again, if you were a child looking at her, blood stained, pale skinned like a ghost, you'd think twice as well.

Ashley blushed, how embarrassing. Heroes shouldn't look like monsters.

"Who… who are you?"

She shrugged.

"Are you going to hurt me?"

She shook her head.

"Are you going to get me out?"

She raised an open hand. He took it.

"I'm Graham, what's your name?"

She shrugged.

"Can you even talk?"

Again, head shaking.

"Oh! Sorry."

Ashley just shrugged and pulled at his arm, urging him to get a move on. The two of them moved through the ruined halls, and were moving towards the back door in the main hall when Ashley fell forward, bringing the two of them to the ground.

The Albino noted that something had forcibly entered her right shoulder from behind. Must have been a rifle round. That sucked.

The boy was up on his knees first, realizing that his protector was on the ground, bleeding. "Hey! Hey! Are you hurt?"

Ashley merely used her other arm to brush him of herself, and pushed him between one of the pews for protection. Wearily, she rose up again in the direction the shot came in.

Another round slammed into her chest, pushing her down the center aisle towards the altar. She got to her feet, still, in full sight of the shocked cultist, who held a semi-automatic rifle in his hands.

"You! You demon! Go back to whoever ordered you to kill us! Realize that you heathens cannot destroy this true ark of God here!"

Ashley pulled over her shattered sunglasses, looked at it in disgust for a few seconds before she threw it away, and looked back at the man squarely with her pink eyes.

And flipped him off.

"Why you-" The man said as he fired. Ashley jumped away, her left arm curling around another blade. As she fell, she threw her weapon, letting it plant into the man's temple while she crashed to the ground.

Graham was already upon her with much ado as she got up. "Hey! Don't do that! What if you die!"

Ashley gave a sheepish look.

* * *

There was a car with several men, when the two exited. Krauser was with them.

(What's with the men?)

"They're here to pick up the kid."

Graham brightened up at the words, "Really! Let's go!" he tugged at Ashley's arm. She didn't budge.

"What's wrong? Aren't you coming with me?"

She shook her head, and pointed back to the church.

"But it's dangerous there! Come back with me!"

Again a negative.

"Tell me your name then! I want to know your name."

She wanted to respond, tried to make a few mouth motions. She took in a few deep breaths.

"A….Aaash…ley…"

"Ashley?"

Krauser interjected, "That's enough. Time to go home."

The suits piled the kid into their car. "I won't forget you!"

The care drove away before Graham could see Ashley's flush. Krauser turned to his charge.

"Ashley, did you get any documents?"

(No. Going back to look.)

"Make it quick."

* * *

Ashley couldn't sleep that night. She couldn't get her mind of the boy. The memory for some reason held great value, like she picked up something in the night on a whim.

Like Trick or Treat, really.

* * *

**Halloween can be horror, or it can be fun. Trick or Treat.**

**Halloween Night: End**

* * *

A/N: This story's tangent went off somewhere. I still like it, in some strange way, but it turned out different than I expected it to be. This is weird.


	5. Blue: Artful Imitation

"Gunslinger Girl" series property of Yu Aida

Original Characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

A/N: I began writing this the day after Halloween Night was posted. One-Shots are deceptively addicting. ARGH. Anyways, try to find the hidden relationship. Family is so fun, after all.

* * *

_It was supposed to be a quiet night. Just Mom, Dad, her sister and herself._

_Then they just barged in, guns and knives in the air, ransacking their quiet home of anything of worth. _

_Money, valuables, happiness, innocence, their future, it was all up for grabs._

_They shot Mom and Dad, hesitated slightly with her. They decided she was too young, so they shot her and went after her older sister._

_She felt tears form in her dull eyes as she heard her sister scream at her body being mutilated and raped beside her family's chilling bodies._

_I'm so sorry I'm such a useless little sister…_

* * *

**Are you here to save the world? You're too late.**

**Person With Many Aliases Presents:**

"**Artful Imitation"**

**A Gunslinger Girl Fanfiction**

* * *

"Wapanese", "Japanophile" Those were words she figured could be indecently called. She didn't care, guilty as charged.

She just absolutely **loved** anime. The sheer ingenuity! The various boundaries those artists' imaginations stretched!

The weapons!

Every time she saw something new, she just pleaded to Vincent to get that model of gun for her. He didn't do it always, but usually when the supply re-stock time came, he would quietly ask a small package of the models to 'expand the inventory'. Vincent, you beauty! You genius!

Her desire to imitate the guns in real life got her in trouble some times. She remembered vividly what happened when they found her customizing her P90 with a new pistol grip so it would look like Jan Valentine's gun from _Hellsing_. Well, it was only right to do so. After all, she did make that cut-down M1 Garland rifle like Luke Valentine's. Family should stick together after all. The two guns rested on a stand in her room now, though the P90 definitely saw more use. Handsome Blue was after all, one of the "Amati Three", the units that compromised the Handsome Men's spearhead.

She sometimes worried how her sister was doing, all by herself in Italy. From what she was told, Sister thought she was the only one left in the family.

One day… one day they would be reunited… like…

She couldn't find a right analogy from her Anime knowledge. Most of the time, the family relationships there devolved into bloodthirsty rivalry. How sad.

"Danielle? What are you doing?" Vincent asked when he came through the door into her little project. He was a thin lean fellow with long brown hair, often seen a variety of strange articles. Hawaiian was the theme of his shirt today. It looked very Vincent-like to Danielle.

Danielle glanced down on the pile of revolver parts lying on her table. "Oh this? I'm trying to modify a Mateba so it'll look like an Angel Arm, like from Trigun!"

"It would be simpler just to import model guns from Japan."

"Yeah, but this is America! You can't even import those in! Besides, it's more fun to make a gun that actually works!"

Vicent gave a sheepish smile and felt a bead of sweat run down from his forehead, "I guess… but aren't you supposed to be off drilling now?"

"Really? Oh Vincent, can I use my special P90? Can I? Please?"

"I still don't see the point of you adding a pistol grip. I read that volume of Hellsing as well, you know. It's impossible to hold a gun of that size in each hand, even for someone of your body-"

"I _knoooooww!_ But I just had to! Can I use it for today? Pleeeeease?"

"Ah well… alright."

"THANK YOU!" Vincent found himself nearly knocked over as Danielle buried her brown her into his stomach, before running back into her room to grab her Jan Gun.

* * *

Vincent watched from monitors in the room at the girls going through each room methodically inside the simulated building. Joseph was beside him at his request. The two of them had been watching for a while.

"Joseph…"

"Hmm?"

"…How is Jihad?"

"She's holding up well. How is your child?"

"As you can see. Spoiled, slightly bossy, but good hearted."

"She loves her sister doesn't she? The one with no name."

"Yeah. Thinks about her all the time. Joseph?"

"Yes?"

"How do you handle it?"

"Handle?"

"The fact your raising a girl who kills for you? Just before this, Danielle begged to me to let her bring her special gun, like it was her favorite toy. She pleads with me whenever she sees a guns she likes, that she wants to get it, like it something in a toy store… don't you just find it sick sometimes! That these girls will never have a normal life? That they don't realize they're not going to have a normal life? How do you… stand up to this?"

"It differs. Jihad was a child prostitute. I see my choosing her as my way of giving her a second chance in life. Now I guide her in her one-body vendetta."

"Is killing for the US Government more meaningful than being a whore… its all doing evil."

"At least I'm not taking advantage of her. But think of it. Most of these girls were picked up from the dregs of humanity, or from the jaws of death. Most of them already lost their normal lives when we picked them up."

"I see…"

"Don't worry, you'll get used it. You did know what you were getting into when you were offered this job?"

Vincent sighed, "Mostly. I guess I sort of realized what I was being told finally when I saw Danielle. I guess I chose her for the reasons you said. I wanted her to live. Some sick sense of mercy?"

Just then a man came in for Joseph and Vincent, "It's big! We found a big name!"

"What? Who did you find?"

"We found Crazy Horse!"

* * *

Mr. Superior threw out copied files around the table. "Jeremy Colt. High-level freelance enforcer, hit man, etcetera. Does the dirtiest and most dangerous jobs nobody else is willing to touch, and he works for the highest bidder. He's an expert gunfighter, and extremely dangerous. Most everybody wants him dead, but he seems to get his way around. kNIGHTS has him on their payroll now. As you can tell from his variety of aliases, he's gotten a pretty big name.

Vincent looked at the photo of the man's grim face and dull eyes that lost the light of life long ago. "Any previous affiliations?"

"None. Apparently he's self-trained, hard as it is to believe."

"Pretty crazy nicknames. '666-lives'? 'Crazy Horse'?"

"Heh, he sounds ready to audition himself into a cartoon." Leon quipped. That got a lot of laughs.

"Well, either way, Colt's high up on the list of people wanted dead. Getting himself into a big organization like kNIGHTS only makes him easier to track. From what we've gathered, he's apparently being lent to some terrorists to transport volatile bombs for them."

"You know where what he's being told to bomb?"

"We have strong suggestions he's going to bomb the New York subway system."

"Damn, that's a lot of tunneling to cover."

"The local authorities there already have set up, but we've been secretly ordered to take him out ourselves if he shows up. Uncle Sam's not taking any risks. The main attack unit is going to split up and patrol the subway cars until the situation is over. Understood?"

A chorus of 'Yes, sirs' replied back.

* * *

Danielle excitedly bounced in her seat in the subway, her personalized P90 concealed in an Amati case. On one side of her Vincent sat, on the other a woman cooed.

"Isn't she adorable? Is she your daughter?"

Vincent seemed reasonably shaken at the thought, "Er… more like a niece. Um… our two families live in different countries. Danielle here, is from Italy, and she's just visiting… it's her first time riding in the New York subway, though I don't know if that's really a good thing.

"It is! It's really cool!"

"What a dear." The woman awed, "Where are you going?"

"Uh… Coney Island?"

"Ah, I see. It is a nice place to visit. Oh, here is my stop. Nice to meet you two. Enjoy your stay here, Danielle."

"I will!"

As the woman walked out of the sliding doors, Vincent sighed and whispered to his charge, "I hope we don't have to do this every ride. We are riding every line end to end."

"But she was a nice lady!"

"I know, but trying out this cover story is very tiring. Calm down a little too, please."

"Okay!"

It wasn't too long after into the ride a man in a pitch-black duster over casual clothes and silver suitcase walked into the car. He slumped against the wall of the train for a while, while opening a bottle of aspirins to practically consume. Slicked back brown hair, and dull brown eyes that looked like they stopped seeing the beauty of life a long time ago.

_That must be him._ Vincent watched out of the corner of his eyes.

The man sat down across from Handsome Blue, slumped and hands in the pockets of his coat. The suitcase he kept between his legs.

The three of them rode like that for a while, every once in a while, the man who was probably Crazy Horse taking out another bottle of painkillers to swallow.

"Umm…" Vincent wondered.

The man gave him a scathing look. "What?"

"…Isn't taking so much unhealthy for you?"

"I have headaches. Piss off."

"Hey! Don't talk to Vincent like that!" Danielle argued, her grip on the handle of her Amati case tightening.

"I can do whatever I want. I'm old enough to have that right."

"Does that include bombing?" Vincent slyly slid in. Jeremy's eyes widened in shock, before reverting to a feigned amused.

"What makes you say that?"

"Because you are Crazy Horse Jeremy Colt, hit man and lackey for kNIGHTS."

Colt apparently knew when the jig was up and spat. "So what does that make you? FBI or something?"

"No. We're the Punishing Rangers: The Handsome Men."

"Very funny. I assume you know what's in this suitcase."

"We have a fairly accurate idea."

Jeremy stood up then, silver case in hand. "Trains make better crashes when you blow up the front. Kill me, if you can."

Colt then walked off towards the front. Vincent nodded to Danielle, who quickly jumped to her feet in the middle of the car, opening up her Amati case to reveal her gun inside.

If the crowd around them didn't pick up what was up in the conversation, they sure did at the sight of Danielle's P90, and Jeremy's own Strayer-Voigt Infinity 1911 that was being pulled out of the recess of his duster.

Screams and gunfire echoed around the inner recesses of the subway train. Colt didn't let either member of Handsome Blue get up from their cover. The extended clip allowed him to unload for a long time, while he carefully backed away towards the front of the car. The number of people escaping from the firefight to the back of the car made it even more impossible, but somehow along the way, some one had pressed the emergency brakes, letting the doors open, so that everyone escaped into the tunnels.

Only three people stayed in the train.

"So you still plan to blow stuff up, Colt!" Vincent shouted down the metal hall. "Nobody left to blow up!"

"It's fine. I'll just leave and find another train to blow up. Just a question."

"If I'm amiable."

"Curious. She's one of those Gunslinger Girls I hear about in the circles these days, right? Like those programs in Israel and Italy."

"Maybe."

"Tch." Colt snorted, before rushing towards one of the open doorways. Danielle's P90 tagged him across the back before he could do so, though, throwing him to the ground.

Danielle grinned, "Got him!" She was more than sure the shot was enough to take care of him. Got to get the gun and bomb away from him, though.

She rushed forwards.

"Danielle, wait-"

She stopped at the sight of Jeremy Colt sitting up suddenly, gun pointed at her chest.

He sneered while a trail of blood ran down his chin. "666 Lives, bitch." With that, he fired several times, knocking her personal weapon out of her grasp and setting her to the floor as well with a bloody chest.

"DAN!"

Vincent fired as well. The shot went deep between Colt's collar and shoulder. The terrorist gritted his teeth, but still his aim was mostly true, as a bullet of his own knocked Vincent down.

Colt and Danielle both got up. Colt was tired, Danielle was in one hell of a fury.

"YOU HURT HIM! I'LL KILL YOU!"

Colt jumped behind some seat as Danielle drew her sidearm Jericho 941 'the baby eagle', and fired several times. Each step taking her closing to the man that dared destroy all she stood for.

When the gun hit empty, she simply rushed up to him and laid a clothesline into his face, launching him across the train car and smashing his back against the door to the control cabin. The Mechanical Body rushed in, eager to drive a fist into Colt's face and out the other end, but was abruptly stopped when the man lashed out with one of his long legs, stamping it into her face. As she staggered back, he took the opportunity to use his useable arm to punch her face as he could.

The metal cheek broke his hand. She blacked out.

"Fuck! That hurt!" Colt hissed as he brought his bloody fist to his lips while looking down at the unconscious girl.

Fuck the bomb. He needed to get out of here now. And if he was going to fight more of these Gunslinger Girls, he would need something that would hold bigger bullets. They were right; nine-millimeter **was** for pussies after all.

Crazy Horse rushed out into the darkness, still untamed.

* * *

"Danielle, it's alright. He just got my arm."

"I let him hurt you! I failed our job!" She continued to bawl.

She may have had a Mechanical Body, but this was obviously one of the times she was still an adolescent child.

"Don't worry. We'll get him next time", Vincent soothed, while he pressed his face over the top of her shivering brown hair.

"W-what would, s-sister, s-say?" Danielle hiccupped. "I w-went bese-serk."

"I forgive you. And she would to, I'm sure."

"You think?"

"I'm sure somewhere out there, she went berserk as well…"

* * *

**Tsuzuku**

**Artful Imitation: End**

* * *

A/N: Colt's my Mary Sue, ha ha. Just kidding. But Colt's age goes as far as two hundred something, canonically. That allows him to expand across a variety of time periods and animes. Right now, he's only about 80 or so, which makes him still pretty embittered, but not yet figured out his philosophy. For readers of my defunct Guilty Gear fics, you can also see he hasn't picked up his favored articles as well.

And have you people figured out Danielle's secret relationship yet? It's a real shocker.


	6. Pink: Idolatry Symbiosis

"Gunslinger Girl" series Property of Yu Aida

Original Characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

Indiscrete References copyright to likewise respective properties.

* * *

"_Mom" didn't want her, and "Dad" was too rich and famous: He couldn't afford to take custody of a child that shouldn't exist. So she made a family the streets. Her new brother was a steel pipe, her cousins was all the money she could get. Biting, bleeding, scratching bruising, that was how she lived._

_She knew she was destined for greater things._

_She passed by one of the orphanages she sometimes shook down for food. Men in suits were there, asking for volunteers in a new state-of-the-art medical program._

_She shoved her way through and signed herself up, top of the list._

_Stardom, baby, here I come…_

* * *

**But was he happy? No. Every night he would cry, begging the Lord. Something deep within needed awakening…**

**Person With Many Aliases Presents:**

**"Idolatry Symbiosis"**

**A Gunslinger Girl Fanfiction**

* * *

She was probably the most Ironic of all the teams, not the mention the oldest, at 13. She was raised on the streets, she had to learn to be loud and dangerous and hateful.

Now she was Love, of Handsome Pink, the team that stressed silent deaths. And her handler was a black guy.

The old humanity in her wanted her to replace "black" with "nigger", like she did on the streets. Emir would have beat up her upside the head though. Unlike the rest of her soft teammates and handlers, Emir wouldn't think twice to use force to show her who was boss. She was used to it.

She loved to hate Emir. Or did she hate to love Emir? He was like her anti-thesis. She was some stupid Chinese bitch gangster wannabe that was desperate enough to sign into the Handsome Men to get somewhere. He was that amazing tall black guy in a white suit, machismo and strength. He turned himself from a point of racial hate into Bloody Heartland, one of the most amazing assassins to grace the face of the planet. The Handsome Men actually asked him to join as a Handler.

She was jealous of him. He was like the god of all the little things in the world. She felt insignificant next to him.

The bastard even had a better gun than her!

Love gritted her teeth and whipped out from behind her cover, black hair with blonde highlights flying around in a high ponytail. She let her Walther give it to the paper terrorists that littered the room. She wore blue jean overalls over a plain white shirt. The simple things always worked best. (She still wanted a classy suit like Emir's, though)

No, it wasn't a Walther P99, it was a PPK Special. That's right, that same pissy James Bond gun. Emir had the gall to hand her that while somewhere in that suit was a gold-plated Desert Eagle!

"So a Surgeon with a Scalpel, the weapon is to the killer. Caliber doesn't count. Whether it hits, does." That was the lesson Love had to learn before she could pick up anything bigger.

She always made sure to hit. Eight bullets. One for each head, every time. She needed to get better, needed to be stronger. What did Emir do? What did he do to rise above humanity and become that amazing killer?

As soon as she exited the concrete jungle of targets and walls, she came face to face with Emir, who stood passively outside, arms crossed.

Love put up a straight face when she looked at him. Didn't want to look weak. Didn't want to look like she needed his praise. "How did I do?"

"You're improving. You're done for today. We might have a job later, so stay ready."

"Of course."

Love cursed Emir's back that walked away from him. Cursed herself for feeling weak.

She thought she was stronger than to feel that pit in her stomach.

* * *

Love kicked her way into the cafeteria. Lunchtime. As usual, most of the girls were there. And there was Danielle in the center stage again, crying her goddamn eyes out for losing to a stupid normal human.

Ashely noticed Love approaching.

"What the hell you looking at, you stupid mute?" Love hissed. Ashley merely shrugged and returned to her food. Love didn't feel like food. She just grabbed a drink out of the fridge, and went to piss the hell out of somebody for the hell of it.

Danielle stuck her head out for first kill. "Hey, don't be mean… Ashley's nice." She objected through her (possibly over acted) sniffles, "Just because you're old-"

"Because I'm old, I have the damn right to say whatever I want! I'm your senior in age anyways!"

Danielle seemed to pale at the words. Jihad as always, sighed. She was probably the only person who had the attitude to match Love.

"Jeez, Love. Stop being a bitch and lashing out at everyone. Did Emir do anything?"

"No, Emir certainly did not do anything wrong, and you are a total retard to believe he'll ever do anything wrong anyways."

Matilda responded "Our Handlers are only human-"

"Fuck! Don't say that! How the hell could you even think that! The Mechanical Bodies are probably the most powerful thing in the planet. How much more great should our handlers be, to be able to command people like us?"

There was a certain amount of thought that came with that. Love did bring up a good point. To each and every one of them, the Handlers couldn't simply be called 'normal'… but were they gods?

Love moaned, annoyed. "God! I just wish I was better! Then Emir would notice me… fuck, all your Handlers are too soft. Especially yours, Danny-girl!"

"Vincent's not soft… He's just… not used to it yet!"

"Hell yeah, he's soft! Emir came after Vincent, and he's got me jumping through hoops like it was the back of his hand."

"Different professions yield different scars of war…" Matilda mused.

That also seemed a good enough comment to still everyone.

"Well, my Handler's still better than your Handler!"

"Hell no! Jose could kick Emir's ass!"

"NO!"

"Liam's better!"

"Mr. Leon is the best Handler."

"NO!"

"UH HUH!"

The conversation quickly degenerated to the way of adolescent girls.

* * *

"Handsome Blue may have failed in eliminating Colt, but the bombing was stopped, and even more good news."

"Yes?"

"We've looked up the materials made in the bomb. Has a very unique signature to its make. Combined with a few off-hand comments that were found in the documents that Handsome Dead obtained, we can draw reasonable conclusions as to whose making the bombs."

"And what's the group?"

"Terrorist-Bomber cell. Call themselves Union Seven. A little bit too egotistical for their own good. They seemed to have confused bomb making with music band publicity. They even have a website."

The PowerPoint showed a picture of the group posed in front of the camera. They sure did have a taste for theatrics. One of them was even wearing a Mexican wrestling mask over their face.

"So we know who did this. Can we pin point their locations based on description?"

"We went through registers. A group of six people checked into the Union Hotel. They pretty much stay there all the time, from what we've gathered from hotel receipts. We take them out, we can avert the bomb problems for now. Might be a slap in the face for kNIGHTS as well."

"So who's going?"

"We've arranged for the hotel to be empty and cordoned off at midnight. Handsome Pink will be in charge of this affair."

* * *

The black van was on the move again. Handsome Mobile to the rescue.

Emir was reading through the document copies, iterating to Love, who was loading her magazines with bullets, the Walther beside her.

"From what we've gathered, they're all living in separate rooms. One of them disguises himself in the Lobby as look out. The rooms they lived in are 203, 306, 404, 502, and 601. We've also got photos of them. Take a look."

Love hummed through the stack of pictures. "…Pretty international group, huh?"

"I suppose there's something to the name, 'Union' after all."

The driver then spoke. "We're at the destination. Handsome Pink, deploy."

As the two jumped out into the midnight, Love's deity in a white suit turned to look down on her. "You take the lead, Love. I want to see your moves."

Love almost smiled and let her eyes water in gratitude. She instead pulled back the slide on her suppressed gun, before concealing it.

"Enjoy the show… Bloody Heartland…"

* * *

The bellhop in the lobby yawned. Another boring night. Night shifts sucked.

Just then, the sliding glass doors made way for a pair of unusual characters. That was a switch. For hours nobody comes in, then the dynamic duo suddenly pops up.

A big black guy in a white suit with a hand casually slipped between the jacket folds. Next to him was a small Chinese girl holding a teddy bear.

"Welcome to Union Hotel! How may I help you?"

The girl held up her teddy bear from behind, "You can die."

The Bellhop's forehead crumpled inwards in a shower of red. The teddy bear's chest smoked for a second, before Love ripped the fuzzy apparel off her silenced gun.

As she headed behind the counter to grab the electronic skeleton key, Emir questioned like any good teacher. "And what makes you presume he's one of the bombers?"

"You said he kept a look out in the lobby. I don't see anyone else here, right? Lookouts always have to be at their place otherwise they're useless. Plus I recognized his face." Love held the key up, "Coming?"

"After you."

* * *

They went to room 203. When Love opened the door, she came upon a hyper Chinese guy who was jumping from one double bed to another, drinking soda while watching pay per view porn. He stopped on one bed when he noticed the other Chinese in the room.

"Huh? I did not order room service!" He said in an extremely accented voice. Love simply raised her gun and blew his head off, making the dead man fall off the bed.

"Room Service knocks on the door before entering, retard."

They headed up the stairs to Room 306. Sliding the skeleton key into the electronic lock, Love easily slipped into an empty dark room. The sounds of a working shower could be heard through the next door. Quietly entering, she found herself in a steam filled bathroom, while a silhouette washed his head with raised arms. Apparently he didn't notice the new presence, being immersed in the amazing sensation of being wet.

He was facing sideways to Love, so his arms were covering his head. His lungs were wide open, though. She pointed her gun lower. Two shots, and the man was collapsing into the tub, clutching his side, and drowning in blood. She noticed the wrestling mask that lay on the sink counter.

"I guess wrestling is faked after all, if you can't take a shot to the lungs."

As she left the room, and met with Emir outside, the two of them heard a voice.

"Oh my god…"

It was the girl bomber, the Japanese one. She apparently was heading over to the mask guy's pad when she came in on the two of them, Love with the gun.

The woman turned around with a scream, and ran up the stairs. Handsome Pink easily strode after her.

It sickened Love somewhat, watching the Japanese run away, dashing into her room to cower. What a real team player. Even, Love, for all that emotion she lacked for her teammates (the actual amount was debatable), would still at least gone out of her way to warn the rest of the Handsome Men.

Love easily opened the door once more, and found her pointed gun facing an empty room. Even the bathroom seemed unoccupied.

She hearing picked up anxious gasping. Coming from the closet.

_You've got to be joking._ "Emir, my bullets aren't big enough. You kill her."

"As you wish." He pointed that god colored Desert Eagle at the doors of the closet and fired several times into the center.

The Japanese woman slumped out, her stomach bloody through her white clothes.

* * *

Room 502 shook things up for a change.

"Fucker! God fuck yourself up the ass and die!" A South American voice screamed through the door, before several shots split through the wood, attempting to hit anything that was on the other side.

Handsome Pink, beside the entrance, looked at each other quizzically.

"Fuck yourself up the ass?" Love repeated, eyebrow raised.

"He obviously heard the gunfire. As you can see, this is what results when you sacrifice stealth for firepower. One step forward, one step back."

"Jeez! Don't be a killjoy, Emir! I'll figure this out…" Love grumbled as she slid the skeleton key through the lock.

As the two barged through the door, they managed to catch sight of the fleeting form of a bearded man clad in underwear and clutching a revolver, as he scurried around the corner. It nearly made Love blind.

This man was a major grade A retard. He didn't even seem to notice the window on the other side of the room was giving away his every movement. Love decided to pop off a shot or two at the corner next to the bomber to keep him where he was.

"Stalemate. We can't approach each other without taking fire." Emir noted.

"Fuck you! Whoever the fucking are! Cuntfucks!" The South American continued to swear. Love just snorted as she watched the man's movement's in the window…

Wait a sec…

Love noticed that outside the window was a balcony. It appeared connected to next door.

"Emir?" She prodded as she turned to her Handler. Motioning for him to stay, here easily nodded, before bringing up his Desert Eagle to bear, slamming more rounds into the wall, and keeping the bomber where he was.

Love was already moving out of the room, and headed next door, room 503. She entered the vacant room, and quickly marched outside into 503's outdoor balcony. It was even an adjoined balcony, shared with the South American's room. Perfect.

Back in 502, the bearded man didn't notice the silhouette outside his window until it was too late.

Glass shattered; the Walther planted a slug into his head, dropping him to the ground with a dull thud.

That left one more bomber, in room 601.

* * *

Sometimes, Emir's thinking completely boggled Love. But then again, Emir was Emir. She should know better than to question the methods of the famous assassin.

But still. The last guy was just standing there with a smirk on his face, hand and gun tucked under an armpit. He even had the gall to ask Emir over for a drink, like he wasn't afraid of him.

And Emir _agreed._ What the hell?

The two sat in front of each other, across the coffee table. The last bomber with that oh-so-smart look on his face was helping himself to a beer. Emir didn't make a motion. Love stood by, ready to defend or attack at any moment.

"So… I recognize that gun. You're the Bloody Heartland, aren't you?"

"And what if I am?"

"You've been killing since you were thirteen! An unstoppable killing record! I don't know whether to have the honor of knowing you, or having the honor of killing you!"

Love immediately had her gun pointed at the man, who raised his own gun to start the stand off. Emir merely gave a dark look at his charge.

"Gun down, Love. You'll kill him when I tell you to."

"…Sorry." She bit out.

"By the way, since when did the unstoppable killing machine get himself a student? That's not like you, from what I hear."

"From what I hear, they say everything about me from being a midget with a dagger, to a shaman that commands ghosts of dead soldiers. I've killed the other five members of Union Seven, now there's only you left."

That irritated the man, who glared. "You think you can scare me? You can't kill this party! Union Seven's gonna burn every government to the ground, and let mankind start from the beginning! You actually are going to get in the way of true freedom? True justice?"

"Since it pays." Emir replied, drawing his gun. The bomber's own gun also was drawn at the same time. The last of the Union Seven flew was knocked backwards over his seat in a spray of blood.

"Hey! I thought you said I was going to kill him!" Love exasperatedly replied.

As Emir walked past her, he simply answered, "Did I lie?"

Love snorted and walked over to the bomber on the ground. He was bleeding badly, choking, but still conscious. Love put another bullet into his head, stilling him.

"Fine, you didn't."

"Let's go, Love. Clean up will handle this in the morning. Good job on leading the charge."

* * *

Ashley was in her room, letting darts fly from her hand to the bull's eye on the other side, when Love entered.

The two stared.

"What?"

Ashley shrugged and continued to play darts, but she did notice a near imperceptible aura of happiness enveloping the older girl, a certain hidden springiness in her step.

As Love settled onto the upper bunk, she noticed a slip of paper rise into her view.

DID EMIR SAY SOMETHING NICE TO YOU FINALLY?

Love huffed and snatched the sheet out of Ashley's hand. "Don't say that. Everything Emir says is a perfectly timed fact, since he's perfect!"

With that, the stupid Chinese bitch slept easy.

* * *

**It's easy to place things on pedestals. Just mind you don't break your neck in the process.**

**Idolatry Symbiosis: End**


	7. Gold: Dark Knight

"Gunslinger Girl" series Property of Yu Aida

Original Characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

Indiscrete References copyright to likewise respective properties.

* * *

_All she wanted was that fairytale picture book._

_In a few short moments, the trip to the bookstore with her parents had become the worst choice in her life._

_A battered car smashed through the front glass before being forcefully stopped on a counter. Masked men barged out, some bleeding._

_Sirens soon came after, but not fast enough to stop the men from shoving a barrel against her and her families temples. A few others were grabbed and shoved near her at gun point._

_A man grunted as she bumped into him, his dazed fingers dropping a bottle of aspirin from his grip._

"_This is the police! You are surrounded! There is no escape, surrender now or we will use force!"_

_There was enough money in the trunk to convince the armed men otherwise. They rushed to the storefront and fired._

_The hostages cowered in the back of the building as best they could._

_No one didn't seem to notice the gas tank leaking on the robber's vehicle until it was too late._

_Flying metal shredded everything. She screamed until her lungs bled while the shrapnel handled everything else. One sizable spear headed for her chest._

_It didn't connect._

_The man with the aspirin sat idly in front of her, the metal shard rammed into his back. He simply bled and popped down a few aspirins._

_That was the last thing she saw before the fire consumed her old life._

**Once upon a time… in a land… far… far… away…**

* * *

**Person With Many Aliases presents:**

"**Dark Knight"**

**A Gunslinger Girl Fanfiction**

* * *

There was an undisclosed location. In that hidden kingdom lay the headquarters of the US's dark pillar of society, the facilities dedicated completely to the armament and training of the Handsome Men. Nine child-valkyries who existed solely to protect the assets of their masters.

There, in a certain warehouse converted the gymnasium use and training, a considerable gaggle of the children sat, watching intently at the two who were being prodded into sparring inside the ring.

Janie, from Handsome Purple was more than happy to obey, hoping for the chance to prove her use in Liam's eyes.

Handsome Gold seemed to be having some problems.

"But, Princess… it's only natural that people of your talents should be prepared in all situations-" Johnny began to plead. Even behind those black sunglasses of his, one could tell by that nervous smile that he was running out of options.

"But this isn't even a logical situation! What's the odds of us actually tangling with another person that's like a mechanical body? Sure there's the Italians and the Israelis, but they're on OUR side, and on the other side of the ocean!" May huffed, "Kicking the butt of an average soldier would be better!"

Johnny merely gave a once over of his child's body posture and noted the tightly crossed arms, "And your not refusing just because you don't want to wear that jumpsuit do you?"

May gave a shake of her brown hair and frowned away in another direction. The suit ended above her knees and elbows, leaving more skin exposed to the cold air than she liked.

"O-of course not! I like the color orange!"

"Get in there already, stupid!" Love from Handsome Pink shouted from her seated position, "Fight Janie already, unless you want to get owned like Danny when she fought that Horse guy!"

"Why don't you come up here and enjoy the sensation of feeling nearly naked!" Was the loud retort.

"Princess… just get in the ring already. We don't have all day…" Johnny sighed. May gave another audible harrumphs of varying sorts before getting in the ring.

"Janie! Prepare to… hmm… be utterly humiliated!"

"No way! I've got to show Liam what I can do!"

The match was surprisingly short in itself. May for the most part, won by pinning her opponent to the ground whilst chewing on her ear.

It was one of those victories that made everyone wonder how the hell May managed to get into the Handsome Men.

Liam for the most part, decided not to hold it against his Mechanical Body for the same reasons.

* * *

"May, I think you should take your training a little more seriously."

May noticed her Handler was using that "You Shut Up Now And Listen" voice

"Hey! I'll be fine!"

"You tend to mess around more in your training than the others. You need that foundation, Princess."

"Hey! I'm a super powerful soldier, or whatever! I can handle everything fine!"

"You shouldn't be saying that while kNIGHTS has somebody like Crazy Horse in their employ."

"Don't wooorry! I'm sure the rumors are just blown out of proportion! Plus, if worse comes to worse, I have my darling white knight to protect this princess, right?"

Johnny sighed, "I'll let you off for now. Just make sure your gun is cleaned and ready."

"Roger! Later!"

* * *

"So what's up for today?"

"Well, Colt's come up to the radar again. We've been tailing him with White Pearl. Apparently a member of the Union bombers wasn't at the hotel when Handsome Pink cleaned house. From our assumptions, because of the ties between the Union Seven and kNIGHTS, it's most likely the survivor went to the kNIGHTS for protection."

Mr. Superior moved to the projected screen.

"As you can see, Colt seems to be making return trips to a certain apartment complex within the city. Other pictures support the idea that the building is a safe house for their organization. We'll be attacking the building within a few days. Any questions?"

"Well, I just find this situation suspicious. Colt suddenly appears and conveniently shows us where an important building for their operation is? I smell a trap."

"True, that's why we've taken extra measures. Handsome Red will be patrolling the outside of the building, and the other two teams for the attack unit is on stand-by. Hopefully if we do this right, we should be able to take them by surprise."

* * *

It was a quiet dark night in the city. For two men and their posts outside the back door, their only counsel was the small lamp attached to the side of the wall above them.

It was rather unfortunate that nights tended to turn foul fastest when it's quiet.

They noticed out of the shadows of the alleys a 12-year-old approach them. The men noticed the eccentricity of the sight before them. A young girl wearing an dark orange duster and likewise colored cowboy hat. The clothes underneath were darker by comparison; navy blue and black, making the colors clash even harder. In one hand she held an instrument case with "Amati" branded on the side.

They watched her walk and stop in front of them and gave a sort of wide-eyed look that could make most men gush. With another hand she pulled out a sheet of paper from her coat.

"Umm… is this117 Conant Street?"

The two men looked at each other for a second before shrugging. Turning back, one of them jerked a thumb behind him. The address number was against the wall showing the address to those in the alley as well as those on the street. It showed the correct location.

"Really! Thanks!"

Without another word, the girl swung her case into the face of the sentry on her right, snapping his neck and launching him through the air. The other looked in shock and began to reach for his gun, before the girl launched a foot into his chest, crumpling the rips and impaling the organs. His death was just about as immediate as the last.

May reached into her coat and took out a wire and pulled it to her ear and mouth.

"This is Handsome Gold. I found the correct address."

"_Any trouble?"_

"Actually not really. They didn't even make a noise."

"_I see. This is a Solo operation, May, so take care of yourself. We'll keep you patched in, so keep your radio on."_

"Bah, why couldn't you come, Johnny? You're so mean, leaving your princess to fend for herself."

_"Don't worry, I'm sure I'd just get in your way."_

"If you say so. I'm going ahead though."

_"Good luck."_

When no more was said, May crouched and opened up her Amati case on the floor.

A stock was unfolded, a magazine was tapped and inserted.

She rose, an AKS-74U, in her arms, the miniaturized brother to the 47 ready to serve.

* * *

It was simple enough matter to kick down the door. The hard part was trying to find the right person to kill. If she was right, the last Bomber was probably in the center of the building. There probably was a man in charge of the building as well.

And this building was a _wreck._ Everything was sagged with decay, sizable holes ate through the wood flooring, and entire walls were knocked down. Furniture was covered in tarps or made of crates.

If May had known any better, the place might have looked like a Crack house out of a movie.

She methodically moved forwards, ignoring the creaking floorboards underneath her.

The peace ended when she found a trio of men with guns sitting around a TV. There was no way past them.

The sounds of her gunning them down echoed throughout the building. May hissed in annoyance but pressed on. Soon enough a man or two with guns started to appear out of the corners of her eyes are various intervals. Each time she either gave them a slip or gave them a compliment of lead.

It was starting to wear on her supplies, though.

May suddenly stopped, when the corridor suddenly emptied out into one simply very large room. In fact it was HUGE. The ceiling was practically gouged out, leaving a small perimeter ring. It looked almost like some sort Foyer…

"Yo, Gunslinger Girl." Colt muttered from behind.

May swirled around, bringing her rifle to bear. The shadowy figure in the black duster of his own, merely lashed out with an outstretched foot, knocking her backwards, and letting several rounds split the floor between them. Dropping the large suitcase that was in his hand, kNIGHTS enforcer continued his to hand assault, never letting the younger girl have the chance to point her weapon, always slapping it to the side, while a fist crashed into the side of her head.

While her vision swam, May finally got back far enough point her AK at the man's chest. She opened up, but Colt merely jumped to the side, and let several round bark in front of him while he gripped the muzzle of her gun.

Another deft motion suddenly found May flipping through the air and painfully flipping unto her back, her own weapon suddenly pointed at her eye.

_OhmygodohmygodohmygodI'mgonnadie-_

"Bang." May's would-be killer merely uttered. Behind him, two men approached.

"Good job! Good job, Crazy Horse! You actually beat her!" One of them cheered while clapping. He was immensely lean and stringed with tattooed muscles. The only thing that covered his chest was a white coat that should have been better used on a businessman. His pants and spit shined leather shoes also said as much. Next to him was an elderly man in a black suit.

"It was a simple enough matter. It doesn't look like she knows how to do CQC." Colt muttered as he walked back to his suit case, May's gun in one hand, and a bottle of aspirin in the other. He let the gun clatter to the floor as he collected his black brief.

Men seemed to crawl out of the shadows with their assault rifles. Men even ringed the remains the floor above, gaining the height advantage over May.

"So, you're totally screwed girl! How does it feel to be trapped finally? Not even your stupid metal body of yours can't stand up to this sort of fire! Totally trapped, bitch!"

May mentally conceded that point in her head. Even if she did put up a fight, she didn't have much outside of her sidearm.

"Hey, Colt! You wanna finish her off? You're the one who got her."

"…Sure…" Colt took a few steps forwards, until his the toe of his shoe was stepping on May's rifle on the ground. "Just a question."

"Yeah?"

"Outside of these men, how many guys are left?"

"I left a few guys around to keep an eye out. Most of the guys are here, though."

"That's very good."

Colt suddenly kicked the Kalashnikov across the floor. May's instinct told her to catch it as it came into here grasp.

"-What the-"

At the same time, Colt's suitcase fell apart, revealing a stubby M4A1 which he pulled into his grasp.

May went for the guys on the floor, Colt aimed at the men above.

In a moment, bodies dropped everywhere in the confusion, while the two suited men backed away. There was a silence as the remaining held fire, unsure what the do.

"W-What the hell, Colt? When the hell did you turn on us?"

"I'm not. I'm still under employ of kNIGHTS. I'm just pruning."

"What!"

"You've made bad use of your time here, Dragon. You've done nothing but embezzle funds from us. I also have this letter here… summing up to say… 'Upgrade me to lieutenant, or I'll will blackmail you.' kNIGHTS doesn't like you anymore. We've liquidated and redirected your assets. All that's left is to send someone to ensure silence."

"F-Fucker!"

"That's right…" Colt couldn't help but grin, "You're fucked!"

"Kill them both!" Dragon managed to shout before he ran. Colt and May fired in tandem, but the old man in the suit got in the way, bullets shredding through him. By then, the other men around them had gotten their beads and retaliated.

May managed to fire what she could, despite the lead that began to impact against her body-

"Let's go!"

-before something suddenly rushed by, picking her up by the back of her coat while the two of them rushed down the corridor, avoiding fire as much as they could.

* * *

"What the hell is wrong with you! You're the sworn enemy of the Handsome Men! I could kill you right now!" May shrieked at her 'sworn enemy'. May had a few decent holes in her, but she didn't seem to notice. Colt himself merely spat out some blood that began to collect in his mouth before he shrugged from where he sat.

"You can't kill me. If either of us die, we'll probably be outnumbered."

"S-so! I've got plenty of friends outside!"

"They're not going to come in time. The only thing left is to kill Dragon, then kill each other."

"Tch…" May snorted, as she squeezed some blood out of her soaked coat, "How did you know we were going to come anyways?"

"You don't think I'd just walk around in the open air in daylight for no reason?"

"Anyways, let's clean up this mess." Colt finished, rising to his feet with help of his gun. May noted the blood that was running in rivulets out of his back.

"Hey… doesn't that hurt? Your normal after all."

"…that's a subjective word… and I've got a high enough pain tolerance." Colt replied, before heading out, stepping over his black blood.

_This sucks! Why am I even putting up with him!_ May continued to wrath in her head.

* * *

Like any well trained team, the two of them swept down the corridor. With two pairs of eyes everywhere now, the two easily picked out targets as they arrived.

They finally arrived to a T-Junction that seemed heavily guarded by a makeshift roadblock and a few Uzis.

May queried the situation, _This seems to be it…_ "You seem to be having fun…" She also deadpanned, watching Colt smile at the sound the wood splintering around them.

"Not really fun… more like… amusing. Should I share a story while we wait for them to get bored shooting?" May's impromptu guardian sneered, before firing a single shot around the corner, eliciting more fire.

May sort of gaped at the hypocrisy.

"Anyways, being with you reminds me of a time when I was in Europe. This was before I was hired by kNIGHTS… man, I wish I could smoke about now… either way…"

Colt fired another round down the hall. It sounded like it hit somebody's head this time. More gunfire.

"Either way, that time I was hired by some chick who worked for some underground society called Soldats. She hired me to kill some girl who was trying to kill some other girls… or something like that, the details aren't clear. But fighting her was fucking fun. She used knives, and I all I had at the time was a Single Action Army. The true test to see which was better, a sharp knife or a sharp shooter?"

"Who won?" May hesitantly questioned.

"She did. She managed to stick a knife in my spine at last minute, but I did managed to give her a lung shot. Of course the moment that happened, somebody tried to finish us off, so we had to save each other. That seems to keep happening to me, I'm on the brink of death, and then I'm suddenly called to save my life. Heh. Took me a quite a few months to rehabilitate my ability even to move a toe."

"…You're really weird."

"Sounds like they're bored."

Apparently, what Colt meant by bored was that they had just taken out the long magazines of their Uzis whilst reloading. They didn't even have a moment to draw a side arm.

With the last obstacle out of the way, the barged through the door at the end, revealing Dragon's makeshift office-

"Die!"

Which also turned into a momentary fallout shelter from a grenade that was hurled through the air.

"SHIT!"

_-Flying metal shredded everything. She screamed until her lungs bled while the shrapnel handled everything else. One sizable spear headed for her chest._

_It didn't connect._

_The man with the aspirin sat idly in front of her, the metal shard rammed into his back. He simply bled and popped down a few aspirins.-_

"…That… fucking hurt…"

_It couldn't be…_

From behind his burning desk, Dragon finally emerged, and saw Colt's slumped form by the doorway. "Got you!"

Crazy Horse's form slid to the side, revealing a tear-stained May, AK pointed at Dragon's chest.

* * *

"Stay still! I got to bind this!"

"…This sounds like a God-damned drama."

"Shut up and let me help you! … Geez, you're a mess…"

"Occupational hazard… why are you doing this again?"

"…do you ever remember going to a bookstore?"

"Which one?"

"A bunch of robbers holed up there…and… just, did you ever go to a bookstore where that happened?"

"Well?"

"…Possibly."

Glass crinkled.

"W-where are you going?"

"My job's done… ow… gotta go before your friends arrive…"

"W-wait! I have to kill you!"

The slide was pulled back; cross hairs were aimed on the man.

"Well?"

A shaking gun.

"…I see… well, until we meet again."

The black figure slipped out of the window. She didn't do anything.

* * *

Later that night, Princess May avoided her white knight and her friends as she hid on the roof, looking up at the stars, ignoring the wounds that needed treatment.

_It couldn't be… _

_I don't want it to be…_

_Why…is it him…?_

She cried.

* * *

**My, My, What Colors these knights come in these days! And she lived Happily ever after?**

**Dark Knight: End**

* * *

A/N: I feel certain vibes of corniness from this… but I planned this one anyways, so I shouldn't complain. Enjoy!


	8. Light Brown: Judge Jury

"Gunslinger Girl" Series property of Aida Yu

Original Characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

Indiscrete References are to their likewise respective properties.

**Apologies for the Long A/N-**

A/N: Nachtsider recently sent me a message, asking for recognition and disclaimer for the references to said Author's Childville/Israeli concept that I keep referencing at times.

How embarrassing. It's like getting a letter telling you're being indicted or sued. Ahhhh…

But it's fair, no?

**"Meir, Aharon, Liesel, Childville/Israeli Mechanical Bodies, and Meir being the resuscitated corpse of Emilio (God Rest His Soul), all references to, previously and from henceforth in this One-Shot Compilation, is the intellectual property of Author Nachtsider, of which Person With Many Aliases denies any claim to."**

(I'll probably have to put one up in the first chapter as well.)

Actually, this brings up another point that I, coincidentally, was going to address. You see, I'm trying to build a fanon in this section. The last fanon I built was in the Guilty Gear section, which was between Zeronova, Samuraiter, and myself. Using a series of indiscrete references, we managed to build a uniformed series of events that fleshed out the Holy War within the series.

Anyways, by mentioning Childville (which has pretty much become mandatory, ha ha), Soldats, etc, I'm trying to link together Sintendo's, Sheo's, and Nacht-y's events into a cohesive fanon. I'm either a genius, or a shameless plugger. Shrug.

(Actually, if I link Sintendo's Liberty story, that'd create a discontinuity, right? Never mind, I'm just linking the existence of Noir to this fanon, which Sheo and Sintendo referenced)

Anyways, everybody play the referencing game! Let's build a nice, big, happy fanon, in which all our creations can frolic and thrive and murder Italian terrorists together in peace and harmony! Reference Israel! Reference Soldats! Reference British Library! Reference Kukri-toting psychos! Reference the Handsome Men!

(Of course, I suppose for Nachtsider's good point, disclaimers can also be passed out if desired.)

* * *

_Cancer. That's what the doctors told her fairly average family, shaking up its normality. Maybe they should have moved out of Hiroshima when their child was born, after all._

_Six Months, that's how long they watched her agonized pale body shrivel before their eyes._

_One night, on her final week, she felt her body being lifted, carried through the halls._

_Am I going to Heaven…?_

**In the case of the People versus… we find the Defendant… Thereby this court sentences… to…**

* * *

**Person With Many Aliases presents:**

"**Judge Jury"**

**A Gunslinger Girl Fanfiction**

* * *

The three members of the Attack Unit of the Handsome men could be found out in the out door range, placing their shots on the targets nestled among the rocks.

Danielle from Handsome Blue could be seen furiously ripping her targets apart, still remembering that day…

May from Handsome Gold was practically in a daze, only giving mercy shots to the head and heart as she wasted time aiming, still remembering that night…

Yuki from Handsome Light Brown efficiently and mechanically made the balance between speed, ammo, and killing. A trio of shots for every target, starting at the torso and moving upwards for a fatal headshot.

She had no time for idle thoughts. Yuki's mind was perfectly conditioned for the job, obviously the reason why she returned to her Handler with the best scores this time around.

"Lazarus. Command accomplished per instruction." Yuki monotonously put it.

It was an odd but fitting contrast, the two of them. On the one hand was a willowy pale child with short black hair, no older than 10, wearing what suspiciously appeared to be one of those sailor outfits that people often claim the Japanese girls wear those days. The other was a tall man, wide as she was thin, dressed in a black suit and blond hair.

Lazarus straightened his tie before giving a blank look at his charge, which did not seem to notice otherwise, "Very good. Go sit in your room until you're called for."

Without another word, the girl set forth to packing up studiously and leaving at a brisk pace. In moments, nothing could have said that Handsome Light Brown was ever there.

* * *

Not surprisingly, due to his rather strange ability to appear and disappear at will, it wasn't a very big stretch of imagination to find the man in the conference room before everyone else, leaning back in his seat with crossed legs and folded hands. As everyone arrived, Mr. Superior began the briefing.

"For the most part, kNIGHTS has been lying low, so we haven't gotten any big leads as to their next move. For now, we're going to prioritize taking out smaller problems that the Government has decided we should handle."

"And what problem would that be?"

An elderly Asian man's picture came into view. "This is Mr. Ogura. We've recently found out that his restaurant is acting as a front for Yakuza operations, mostly drug smuggling operations. It's been decided that having even a toehold for a new group, so we're going to eliminate Ogura, along with anybody else associated with his activities."

"Any possible connections to kNIGHTS?"

"Possibly, but then again, kNIGHTS hires out men to anybody, so it may not be a big surprise. As usual, since we have the Attack Unit operational, we'll be sending them again."

* * *

The three girls were in Yuki's room, enjoying the quiet with their chosen drinks. If there was one problem one could say about Yuki, was her stubborn desire to take every command from her Handler literally. This time, it meant that Yuki was seated in her room, and refusing to budge even an inch from her seat until Lazarus said so.

May gave a sort of shy out of the way look to Yuki before posing a question to her, "Say, Yuki?"

"Yes."

"What do you think of… Colt? That guy we fought a few times?"

"He is one of the highest priority targets of the Handsome Men, enforcer for mercenary organization kNIGHTS, in any situation whereupon contact with him is initiated, I am ordered to attack until the target's bodily functions vital to his survival is inoperable."

"So… you're going to kill him?"

"That is the colloquial term."

Danielle harrumphed at the memory of the man, "Yeah! Yuki, if you ever see him, beat him up real good for me!"

"Your request is irrelevant and redundant. Any situation whereupon contact is initiated, I will attempt to damage his body beyond recovery."

"Well, just remember to give him one for me!"

"I do not know how to accomplish that vague request. However, I will perform to the best of my ability to eliminate whom you could not."

Danielle shrugged, "Eh, I guess that's the best I'll get."

May remained silent. When Lazarus came to collect his girl, thoughts ran through her head as she watched Yuki's disappearing back.

* * *

May found Yuki in the armory. They were alone.

"Yuki, can I talk to you?"

A confused look.

"You are already giving me information vocally."

"Eh? Never mind, I need to ask something of you."

"Yes."

"Yuki, if you ever meet Colt… can you not kill him?"

"I am unable to comply. My orders are explicitly to ensure cessation of Crazy Horse's vital body functions. Your request is overridden by Lazarus' command."

"But can't you do it for me? I'm your friend! We don't have to kill Colt to get rid of kNIGHTS! If we get rid of kNIGHTS before-"

"If mercenary organization kNIGHTS is rendered inoperative, Crazy Horse will still be active as a hired killer for other groups. Crazy Horse is considered extremely dangerous by criminal investigation organizations internationally. His tie to kNIGHTS ensures a higher chance of tracking and subsequently elimination. This is the reasoning behind his focused elimination by the Handsome Men."

"Please… just shoot him in the head, then…"

"May I have permission to understand your desire to ensure Crazy Horse's survival, or elimination without extended periods of nervous pain sensory?"

"Promise not to tell anyone?"

"I will not emit information at my own discretion. I cannot refuse if interrogated, though."

"…He saved my life."

"Voluntarily or involuntarily?"

"Voluntarily."

"I see. You're perception of his relation to the Handsome Men has changed because of this."

"He's not a bad person, Yuki!"

"The extent of his intent is irrelevant to me. His position puts him at odds with that Handsome Men, therefore I must eliminate him if we initiate contact."

They said nothing more as Yuki walked past her friend and out of the room, her gun stored in the Amati case.

* * *

"Welcome! Welcome!"

"Table for two."

"Yes, please! Right this way!"

The place appeared to be a pretty fancy Japanese restaurant; the kind that seemed completely made of wood and backlit paper sliding walls, so that it'd play to the foreigner's stereotypical view of the culture. A cordoned off stairway led to a second level balcony that appeared to hide the offices of the restaurant behind more of the sliding panels. A man and a girl slid into a small booth against the wall, staring at their menus without paying attention.

"Yuki. How many people in this building are civilians just eating?"

The girl closed her eyes and concentrated. If she listened hard enough, Yuki could nearly make out the sounds of gun frames clinking from within their holsters or belts.

"Twenty of the fifty on this floor are not carrying weapons. I am unable to determine the exact number of civilians. If all unarmed persons are considered civilian, the majority will be able to escape the premises in combative situation."

"Assume that. We've set up a fake construction crew outside to mask the noise. Start some ruckus unseen, so that we can sort out who's who."

"Yes, Lazarus."

Underneath the table, nimble hands undid the catches on her Amati case, pulling free a Colt Patriot. The small frame of the modified M16 allowed it to fit easily within, with extra room for its most infamous aspect.

A double drum 100-round magazine was also removed and slapped into the bottom of the gun.

Pulling back on the slide underneath the table, Yuki kept her head pointed towards her menu that was resting on the table, while she aimed out of the corner of her eye, her gun aiming from underneath her table.

There was a particular table of men across the room, the one in a suit, whose back was facing Handsome Light Brown was particularly rowdy.

It didn't stop the noise of clinking from coming through, though.

The back of his left shoulder exploded in a spray of blood. Yuki's face grimaced just the slightest.

"You missed." Lazarus noted amidst the screams. The tempura dish looked appetizing to him, pity he wouldn't be able to order.

"My apologies."

She fired two more times, this time tagging the man in the center of his back, knocking him forward into his food laden table. More horrified screams came out as various people either ducked under their seats or ran out the exits.

Yuki took a few more potshots at other men she could identify as threats, before her Handler spoke up.

"I think that's enough. You're free to expose yourself."

"Yes, Lazarus."

At that command, Yuki easily slid out of her seat and jumped to her feet, the Patriot in her small arms.

Now that the Yakuza could finally see who was behind the shooting, several of them pulled out their handguns.

Yuki did what could have been colloquially known as "Spray and Pray", except she didn't know how to pray. She didn't need to either.

She sprayed and she sprayed and she sprayed, throwing tables, exploding china, ripping paper and wood, launching men off their feet.

Within moments, the restaurant was devoid of any movement, save the few sobbing noises of hiding innocents.

Yuki didn't identify the noise as a threat, and dismissed it.

"Yuki, Mr. Ogura is probably upstairs. Please eliminate him."

"Yes, Lazarus."

Stepping up the stair, Yuki arrived on the balcony with her gun up. Testing one of the sliding panels, it appeared that most of them were fixed in place, leaving only a certain one that she couldn't tell, as the real door. The fact didn't stop Yuki, though. She just smashed through the paper and wood in front of her, bringing her into a desk and gangster filled office room.

She sprayed.

Amidst the blood and exploding cotton and plastic of the cubicle walls and chairs, she noticed on the far end of the room was another private office with a wide window inside.

Mr. Ogura was inside, with five other men.

One of them was Crazy Horse, who had just pulled back the slide of his AA12 Automatic Shotgun.

The two of them didn't even flinch as they saw each other; they simply redirected their weapons and pulled.

Glass shattered and nearly everything that remained in the office between the two quickly disappeared. Crazy Horse's form quickly disappeared under cover, while Yuki continued to fire, filling the windowed office with smoke. She stopped when she could not determine any targets under the smoke she was intending to use to lure them out.

Immediately, kNIGHTS' enforcer barged through the door of the office, spilling smoke everywhere, his face between gritted teeth and a grin, his shotgun ripping the entire time. Yuki ducked behind the cubicle walls while the steel grain shaved away the office space around her.

"Go! Go!" He shouted while swinging his arm. Out of the smoke came the four other bodyguards, with Mr. Ogura stuffed between them, while they escaped through the sliding door. Yuki couldn't even fire through the paper walls from her position, as shot flied through the air and kept her pinned.

Soon enough, it was just the two of them in the desecrated room.

Crazy Horse jumped onto a surviving table, letting his gun scan the room as he talked, "This is getting redundant. Third time already. How many of you girls are in this country anyways?"

Yuki didn't respond, instead opting to zone into his position from his voice.

"I see you're one of those 'Silent-killer' types, huh? Fine, whatever." He spat, before his shotgun spat out more rounds, blowing away the remainders of Yuki's cover, while the girl dashed towards another portion of cover, while her Patriot fired between the spaces. Crazy Horse sneered and swung his body sharply to one side letting the bullets crash into the ceiling behind him, while just one gashed his shoulder.

The two continued to trade rounds, neither truly hitting each other to full effect.

Yuki's Patriot hit a hollow sound on the next pull of the trigger. It didn't stop her in the slightest. Rushing out from out of her cover, she charged straight on towards Crazy Horse's grin and his aimed shotgun. Both hands curling around the grip, Yuki heaved back and flung forward her arms, her machine gun spinning through the air. Her enemy merely shot it out of trajectory, before aiming again at the girl who was still running forward, her hand pulling out a USP. Crazy Horse fired first, the spray of pellets slicing her cheek and smashing into her left side with enough force to spin her around. She easily used the new momentum to throw her aim around again and squeeze off a shot of her own, bringing a slug into Crazy Horse's chest, knocking him off the desk as well.

They rose at the same time, Yuki with her gun, and 666-Lives throwing away his empty AA12, while filling his mouth with more aspirin. The man rushed forward suddenly, armed with nothing but his bare hands, whilst Yuki fired. Again he twisted out of the way, the round mere spilling blood against the side of his hunched body. Before she knew it, she found the arm holding her gun was wrapped in a lock against Crazy Horse's side, while another grabbed the back of her shirt. The man dragged her forward into a wall, smashing her skull against it with enough force for her dazed fingers to let slip her weapon. Crazy Horse continued this a few more times, before Yuki could bring a foot up against the wall. Kicking, the girl's small but inhumanly powerful form threw the two of them backwards, letting them crash against the cubicle, Crazy Horse taking the brunt of the blow as they collapsed amongst the ruins. As they rose, Yuki reached across the ground, before swinging single-handedly a wheeled chair into her enemy's upper chest, knocking him back through the air.

As she approached the fallen man, Crazy Horse got to his knees, grunting as he hefted the wreckage of a computer at Yuki, who knocked it away. She was suddenly knocked to the side, as the man pulled out a metal rod out of the wreckage and swung. Hefting the bar in both hands, Crazy Horse swung for a Homerun, cracking it back and forth against the sides of Yuki's face, while her head jerked to and fro. Yuki lunged out suddenly, catching the rod in mid swing, holding it firm even as Crazy Horse hissed and tried to jerk the weapon out of her grasp. Grabbing the bat with both hands, the girl easily bent the rod in two in front of hit man's eyes. At the sight of his useless weapon, he let go first, leaving Yuki suddenly holding the bat herself, while Crazy Horse swung around and landed an elbow into her face.

Stumbling back, Yuki didn't have time to defend as a heel of each palm suddenly crashed into the sides of each neck with enough force to make her hack up blood. Even that, she couldn't complete, as Crazy Horse's hands encircled around her neck, thrusting her forward against a wall, while thumbs pressed into her throat. Struggling for breath, Yuki tried to kick, but her enemy was stepping on her feet. Her arms too, were too short to reach out and hit his chest that seemed suddenly miles away, while his arms stretched out and choked her.

Yuki watched in horror at her vision slowly going hazy, while she gulped desperately, the vice around her neck like steel. No matter how she pulled, her throat remained closed.

_I can't die! I can't die! I can't die! I can't die!_

_Yuki, Mr. Ogura is probably upstairs. Please eliminate him._

_I CAN'T DIE!_

Yuki's balled up her fists punched upwards into the bottom of Crazy Horse's elbows. Both limbs suddenly snapped 90 degrees. Backwards.

He screamed in pain as his grip suddenly grew limp and bloody.

Hissing, Yuki drew back, and shot her fist forward into Crazy Horse's gut with as much strength as she could. The man folded in half over the limb that was trapped in his stomach, throwing up blood. Yuki pulled out and drew her fist back again, and lunged upwards into Crazy Horse's lowered face.

Eyes rolling back, nose broken in a stream of blood, he flew through the air onto his back.

Yuki jumped for her USP that was lying on the ground, whilst Crazy Horse moaned and stumbled to his feet using a wall for support, sounding like a dying animal. Slumping against a windowsill, he looked on dazed as a vacant-eyed girl, body streaming with red, aimed her gun at his chest.

He chuckled.

A blast, and Crazy Horse was thrown backwards out of the window.

There were sounds of a lumpy form hitting metal railings and dump boxes.

Staggering forward, Yuki looked out the shattered window, and saw a blood stained form lying in the alleyway, unmoving. Unable to verify whether the man was alive or dead, Yuki stuck her arm out the window, her USP aimed at his back.

… _Can you not kill him?"_

Yuki blacked out.

* * *

"….waking…!"

Yuki's eyes fluttered rapidly, testing the light as she awoke. When she was finally stopped getting blinded by the light, Yuki found herself in a medical ward, her bed surrounded by the Handsome Men. She herself was wrapped up in linen all over her body, especially around the head.

"Yuki! You're alive!" Danielle whimpered.

"It appears my body is up to a satisfactory operating level."

"You should know how worried we were!" Jihad complained at the lack of gratitude.

"The damage to your head and chest made the operation very delicate." Matilda explained.

"I understand. I have failed to eliminate Mr. Ogura, though."

"Don't worry about that! Danielle and I took care of him while he was headed out the back. You should be more worried about… you! You took a beating!" May consoled.

"…I see." Yuki finally decided to say, noticing there was a certain lack of details of her mission that wasn't being mentioned.

One by one, the girls slowly drifted out of the room. Then there was only May and Yuki left.

"Yuki?"

"Yes."

"…Did you fight Him?"

"The specification of the word 'him', coupled with my knowledge of you, up to the before the mission, concludes you are speaking of Crazy Horse."

"Well… yeah. As far as I know, there's really only one guy who can fight Mechanical Bodies. Did you fight him?"

"I engaged in both firearms and close range combat."

"But we didn't find his body in the area. Does that mean-"

"Jeremy Colt, also known as Crazy Horse, upon my last memory of my contact with him, had received numerous serious trauma to the head and chest with use of bare hands or blunt objects. Both his arms were dislocated and broken at the elbows, serious physical trauma was inflicted to the lower abdomen, two bullets of 45 caliber had penetrated his body in the upper torso, and he had received physical trauma to the vertebrae and chest of an unknown intensity, when he finally was thrown out of a second story window."

May winced at every description, and her spirits continued to fall. "But… he's not dead."

"I was unable to confirm total cessation of the target's bodily function at the time, though the physical damage is extreme for an non-mechanized body. However, given your report, there appears to be a probability of his survival. Or an unknown party had removed his corpse before the arrival of reinforcements."

May continued to try and struggle with the information. "So did you kill him or not?"

"Unsure. It appears I had subconsciously attempted compromise."

"Compromise?"

"A portion of my intellect desired to maintain the promise you wished of me, for Crazy Horse's survival. The greater part recommended following the order of his elimination. By severely damaging his body, yet not confirming the cessation of his vital functions, it could be I was attempting to remove my choice in the matter."

"How?"

"By leaving it up to Crazy Horse whether he would be strong enough to remain conscious until he receives optimal medical aid for his injuries."

"So… you didn't kill him, but you beat him to an inch of his life and left him to see whether he dies or not."

"I believe that is the colloquial term. Are the conditions satisfactory for completing your request to me?"

May sighed.

"I guess that's really the best I can ask of you. Yeah, you kept your promise."

"Very good. I suggest you leave the premises, before Lazarus enters."

"Okay, okay. I'll leave you to your Handler. Later!"

Yuki watched the girl leave the room, before lying back and staring unfocused at the ceiling.

She waited for her Handler.

* * *

**Isn't Compromise such a beautiful thing?**

**Judge Jury: End**


	9. Black: Non Existence

"Gunslinger Girl" Series property of Aida Yu

Original Characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

Indiscrete References are to their likewise respective properties.

A/N: This is it. This is the end. Probably not. But let's not get our hopes up. Counting eggs, and such.

I dedicate this chapter to Raiden from MGS. Poor guy.

And there's a Sheo Darren reference. Disclaimer or something.

* * *

_The whistle blared. The Kid's Army was forced outside into formation, through disparaging shouts of their captors, and the buckles of their metal belts._

_As they formed up, the captors walked passed each of them, shoving an AK-47 into each kid's arm. She thanked God Almighty that the army had run short of kids, and were forced to grab a girl from the pool of the kidnapped, essentially saving her from fate worse than death._

"_Listen up, you stupid pieces of shit! The enemy is approaching. I expect each and every one of you to return here with ten people killed, or else you ain't eating! You fucking got it?"_

"_YES SIR!"_

_A few hours later, she found herself lying on her back, vision hazy, and her lungs filling with blood._

_She couldn't move. Everything hurt too much. She wanted to cry out for a mother, but it would get her shot._

_Footsteps stopped by her head._

"_What about this one? We should just put her out of her misery."_

"_No. We should save whomever we can. We're not like them, damn rebels…using kids against us…"_

_A few minutes later, she was in a stretcher._

* * *

**It's a shame we have to disappear! No one's getting out of here, ALIVE!**

**Person With Many Aliases presents:**

"**Non Existence"**

**A Gunslinger Girl Fanfiction**

* * *

There is a certain set of buildings in the secret headquarters of the Handsome Men. All the Mechanical Bodies are prohibited from entering, Handlers slightly less so, but only because they were adults.

There a girl lived.

She watched from a balcony. She was pretty sure that White Pearl, as well as the others, didn't suspect that another would be watching them.

They stood grassy back lot, celebrating. In the center of it all was a silent, but no less bashful White Pearl, holding up a large revolver.

How long ago was it, when she heard a rumor of one of them being challenged to score 500 point? It seemed so long ago, when she heard the rumor from the doctors.

She wished she could join them. She couldn't. She was too different. Far too different.

She looked at herself in a mirror once. Almond eyes and dark skin and dark hair, and always perpetually dressed in a white gown and slippers. From what she read, that made her from somewhere… desert-like. Nothing like the rest of them.

They were chosen. She was picked up.

She never had a Handler. She wasn't intended to have a Handler. They just used enough of the Conditioning process to make her subject to everyone.

She even had to take her designation as her name.

"Black? It's four 'o clock. You should go before it gets too late." A doctor mentioned while passing by.

"Yeah."

The girl who called herself Black headed to the test chambers.

* * *

Black looked on in interest as one of the lab-coats pulled on a new skin over her muscles and carbon bones.

"What's this for?"

"It's a new skin we've been developing for the Handsome Men. It has flexible resin built in molecularly. Sort of like a hidden plastic layer."

"So it would make… the Handsome Men more resistant."

"Bullets will probably get though it, but it should stand up to simple bladed instruments or blunt objects. We've already tested the skin alone, but we've yet to see if the application to a Mechanical Body will change anything. Anyways, that's why you're here."

"The Mechanical Advancement Unit. Eternally sacrificing Black." She cynically celebrated.

"Don't speak like that, you're still very useful, even if you aren't being used to run around shooting people."

"But I'm always in the lab… I never get to see if I ever made any change…"

"Believe me, you've helped. Personally, I think it's better to participate in creation, rather than destruction."

"Debatable. After all, any successes you have on me will be used on the other Handsome Men, which in turn will help them kill more efficiently."

That stopped the doctor. He gawked, and then laughed.

"I guess you're too smart for me, huh?"

She shrugged.

"Anyways, let's get started."

* * *

The test was for the most part, successful. The skin could stand up to a bladed object at least one time, before another blow in the same place would pierce through. The resin made the skin a little stiff, though. It would probably take a couple of months before it would soften up (Which meant she would have to be tested again on the softer resin. Bah)

This was annoying. She just finally got used to her new ambidexterity, and now she had to get used to this.

Black sighed, as she entered the library, her left hand bandaged.

Black, nearly confined as she was, had a few things to keep her entertained. She had a whole library to burn through, and she always had time to go on the Internet.

She felt like the Internet today.

Moving through the electronic world, she often searched for things that happened in Italy. Her brethren always intrigued her, the Social Welfare Agency, which existed in that place. The other thing that interested her was the mind of the terrorist, the sworn enemy of the Handsome Men. Knowledge is power after all, and she wanted to know what exactly these people were willing to delude themselves into.

Of course, the websites for Italian newspapers always had, at one time or another, some story about "gang wars" which seemed to always consequently leave Five Republic members dead. (Ironically, this tended to create the idea that the Five Republics had a huge member-roster, since they were always being killed). It wasn't far to assume that SWA had a bullet in each and every one of the attacks.

These days, Black also read up on the Five Republics website, which called for freedom of northern Italy from the "disease of capitalism". The arguments were very good… but…

That Certain User always frequented the forums, using well-designed logic and reasoning to shoot down the budding aspirations of interested newbies.

Black admired this person. He or she was smart. Not only in way of knowledge, but also because the user had common sense to not bother with converting the Hardcore radicals. It was like watching a war of words on the Internet.

Black had watched this person everyday, before she finally had enough and decided to contact this girl herself.

**Hello,**

**I've been reading your arguments on the Five Republics website for a while. I agree with your overall belief that Five Republics is in the wrong. Though I question, do you think that Five Republics itself is the problem, or do you think it is just merely the technique? Do you think that Five Republics can protest in some other form?**

**-Black**

There was no threat in using her real name. It didn't even sound like a name anyways. A reply came a few days later.

_**Greetings.**_

_**I thank you for your support. I've been a regular at the site, though some times I wonder if I reach anybody. You are the first. However, I believe that Five Republics is beyond help. They are completely intermeshed with their technique. Five Republics, simply put, is just a terrorist organization. They should be crushed completely, because they will not change.**_

_**If you wish, we can continue correspondence over the matter.**_

_**-Claes.**_

So she uses "Claes", now huh? At least it gave a gender. Now Black could sort of envision a real person behind the voice.

**You're certainly a forceful person. But even if 5R is so completely beyond help as you say, does that justify all the deaths over the news? Is arrest an option. **

**Don't mind me, I'm just being Devil's Advocate.**

**-Black**

_**If I believe, most of the people on the news tend to be high-ranking members. These people do not change their ideals for anything. Lesser member, the little errand boys, if you will, can be disheartened rather quickly at the news of the death of their superiors.**_

_**Kill the Head, and the Body dies. At least in this case, this body can move on in life and get over it's own stupidity.**_

_**-Claes**_

**Is that why you work so hard in trying to dissuade the new comers to the forums?**

**-Black**

_**They are merely fresh-minded intellectuals who believe they know what they're saying. I am far more intimately knowledgeable on the activities of this particular terrorist group.**_

_**-Claes**_

**So, you're some sort of conspiracy theorist?**

**-Black**

_**No, I merely have friends who are dedicated to cracking down on them.**_

_**-Claes**_

**Carabinieri?**

**-Black**

_**A more specialized group, but a few members hail from there.**_

_**-Claes**_

* * *

**Sorry, haven't talked to you in a while.**

_**Don't mention it.**_

**I've been busy these past few weeks. That medical program I'm part of had a new big project, so it was stressful.**

_**At least you're talking now.**_

**Say, how are things over there with your friends?**

_**Fairly well. We might be hitting a big break.**_

**And you're going in with them?**

_**Not really. I told you, I'm more of a bookkeeper, a person who keeps to the background.**_

**How funny, we're alike in that way, I guess. My colleges tend to take the bigger part of the credit, too.**

_**And they say that only opposites attract**_

**Very aptly put.**

_**Curious.**_

**Yes?**

_**For all our correspondence, we've never really spoken of each other beyond our professional life.**_

**Well, I guess I can say that I'm mostly live for my job, really. Can't do anything else but work.**

_**Likewise. I have much spare time, but most of it always ends up relating back to my work, in the first place.**_

**Do you have any hobbies?**

_**I garden.**_

**Is it fun?**

_**It is rewarding, to say the least. With my work so often dedicated to the elimination of terrorist elements, it is not often I have time to create, instead of destroy. You are lucky. You work for medicine. You heal people.**_

**I shouldn't say I'm much better than you. My medical program is funded by the military. Medicines I help test, end up being used for soldiers, so they can live longer to kill other people.**

_**That is far too pessimistic a view.**_

**You're right. We should stop thinking like this. I make medicine that saves people, and you work in your police unit to save people as well. It just seems that we're just closer to the killing than other people.**

_**Comforting words, Black**_

**Thank you, Claes.**

* * *

Black laughed out loud at the story Claes was sharing with her.

"Triela was a wreck by the end of the week. She was so intent on keeping those pictures." Claes sighed.

"So what did you do?" Black inquired.

"I had to finally appeal to her stepfather on the matter. He bought Triela some nightgowns in return for the pictures." Claes explained.

"And she actually agreed?" Black was slightly skeptical.

"What can I say? She treasures everything he gives her."

"That was so funny! A picture of you in farm clothes…"

"It's nothing special really." Claes said with a dismissive shrug

"It must have been, if Triela was willing to practically risk her life and sanity for it." Black said through her snickers.

It took a while for Black to catch her breath. In the mean time, Claes took the opportunity to talk.

"Are you satisfied with your life?"

Black blinked and raised an eyebrow. "Why the sudden melodrama?"

"I'm just curious for your opinion, since we're so similar in the position of our profession. Neither of us are able to directly contribute to the front-line of our work, yet at the same time, we both know that is the place we cannot go."

"Well… I am happy. But sometimes… I'm also lonely."

"Lonely? But you speak of your colleges so intimately, I would have thought you personally know them." Claes pondered, confused.

Black shook her head. "Not true, actually. The project I'm part of… I'm sort of like a black sheep. I don't exist to them, and they never really questioned where all the new stuff comes from anyways. They just think it's just a bunch of scientists…. But I always watch them from afar… that's why…"

"Black… are you guinea pig of some sort?" Claes suddenly realized.

Black gave a bitter sound, "I know I shouldn't be ashamed… but yeah, I sometimes feel like I'm just a play toy. They get to have all the credit for saving people, but I'm not supposed to be noticed…"

"How similar we are…" Claes mused, "But I should also apologize. In some ways, I cannot understand. Even with my lack of front-line participation, I still am allowed to associate with my peers."

"You're lucky."

"Still in some ways, I also have things I wished to have along side my peers here. They have a family. I am, for the most part, orphaned."

"Really?"

"Indeed. It stings some times, as I watch them enjoy their company with their… parents."

"Claes, do you think sometimes we're mistakes?"

"Elaborate."

"We're both sort of like, replaceable. Blue collar, in a way. We do all the menial little things, don't get very far, not expected to do anything great. Sometimes I feel like I'm a scrap off the floor they decided to pity enough to make use of me…"

"Shut up. That's disgusting and defeatist." Claes snorted.

"But it's true, in some ways."

"Only if you view menial tasks as useless. We're important in our own way. We've been chosen to be part of something beyond just us. We may be still orphaned scraps off the floor, but at least we're still around. That means we're still valuable in our superior's eyes."

Black hummed at that thought. "I guess you can say we're a sort of foundation."

"Perhaps I may never be as useful, but I refuse to lie down and be completely useless just because."

"You're right."

"We must keep a tally of this."

"One day. It's great to know somebody like you, Claes."

"It is enjoyable to have a knowledgeable opinion like you, Black."

Black turned away for a moment, distracted by something. She turned back to her friend right after.

"Sorry. I've got to test something again. Talk again later?"

"Very well. In fact, we both like to read, yes?"

"Yeah?"

"Read something radical. Let us pick apart its logic together, the next time we meet." Claes challenged, sly smile forming.

"That sounds fun. I'll get something when I come back" Black replied, full on grin of companionship.

"I'll be waiting."

* * *

(BLACK has signed off)

(Claes has signed off)

* * *

**I think, therefore I am, even if unnoticed.**

**Non Existence: End**


	10. Colt: To Serve

"Gunslinger Girl" Series property of Aida Yu

"Noir" Series property of Bee Train

Original Characters property of Author "Person With Many Aliases"

Indiscrete References are to their likewise respective properties.

A/N: The amazing extra chapter… Mental slumpage, this is all I can afford my brain to get to doing. I NEED TO WORK ON NARUTO, NYYEARGH!

* * *

_When he awoke, he found himself suspended in illuminated liquid, a glass wall separating him from the world, a tube of oxygen keeping him alive._

_Where am I? Let me out! I want my mom!_

_Men in white coats and military emblems gawked at him patronizingly from the other side of the looking glass._

"_As you know gentlemen, we have been keeping track of various ways to improve combat efficiency in today's modern soldier. As of now we have concluded that manipulating the power of those gifted in psychokinetic talents will result in the best results. Introducing certain artificial elements into the subject's bloodstream will result in psychokinetic alteration when the brain is completely enmeshed with the chemicals. The subject you are presented with is the youngest we have acquired that shows great psychokinetic potential, which means when he comes of mental maturation, his ability should exponentially multiply in relation. We were originally planning on using our finished products on the armies of the Nazi German empire, but since the end of the war is projected to end very soon… I'm sure finished products can be used for peacekeeping duties or such. Stand back, we are about to begin the enhancement process-"_

_Enhancement process? What! Let me out! I don't want this! I want my mom! LET ME OUT!_

_Mechanical arms entered the waters, tipped with syringes piled with black sludge._

_They stabbed everywhere, every artery, and every bit of exposed skin, the needles stabbed into him, covering his naked body in stainless steel._

_There were only sounds of muffled screams._

_STOP IT! STOP! IT HURTS! I WANT MY MOM! STOP! STOP!_

_Two needles angled in front of his eyes._

_NO! NO! STOP!_

_They plunged through jelly, injecting the sludge into the nerves behind._

_AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHMYHEADHURTS._

_MY HEAD HURTS._

* * *

**Man cannot serve both God and Money…**

**Person With Many Aliases Presents:**

"**To Serve"**

**A Gunslinger Girl/Noir Fanfiction**

* * *

The sun rose in Paris, and light came through a fair sized artist studio and upon two figures in the same bed, their weapons naked and ready at each other's sleeping body.

The larger of the two rose up first, yawning indiscreetly, and running a worn hand through brown hair that was slicked back into spikes. Notably, his face (and most likely the majority of his body) was quite heavily gauzed.

He reached for a bottle of aspirin beside the table and downed the entire container down his throat, beginning his morning ritual.

_Another damned day like this_. Jeremy Colt groaned. He wasn't usually the type to sit still and rot in holes. Naturally when his physical condition and current situation forced him to do the exactly that –trapped as a paraplegic and hide in his Paris safe house for weeks while those suits were out to kill him and the girl- he wasn't the happiest of campers.

"Oi, Chloe. Get your ass up."

The slimmer form beside the man groaned and mumbled something incoherently, but for the most part stayed blissfully asleep like a child.

Colt swore under his breath. He didn't dare touch the girl like this. She was one of those types that had those trained subconscious reactions to break your arm in self-defense. Still, that didn't mean he couldn't…

The older killer pulled out Single Action Army he was holding out from under the sheets, pointed it at nowhere in particular and cocked the hammer.

The loud sound of the clicking metal had the bandaged redhead burst out of her sleep, a small dagger in her hand, ready to throw into the man's smirking face.

"Yeah, like I said, good morning." Colt chuckled in his seated position, while de-cocking his weapon. With that, Chloe also fell onto her side, clutching the sore and still healing hole in her lung that she unexpectedly wrenched in her survival maneuvers.

"Honestly, girl… so sprung up and freaking out over every little thing. I can tell that you're going to die because you were being emotional and you made a stupid mistake." Crazy Horse mocked, sliding out of the bed by his hands, and dragging himself into a wheelchair he procured recently.

"Silence… you have no right to judge me… you insult to assassins…" Chloe hissed as she pushed her face from the bed to glare at the man wheeling away, his lower body inoperative. Even with the few weeks they spent together, it would be a while before their injured bodies would be a far cry to their condition before their last fight.

"Sure, sure. As soon as you're done writhing around on the bed like a bitch on period, find me in the kitchen."

* * *

Chloe usually ate for the two of them. Colt usually couldn't hold anything down beyond copious amounts of alcohol, aspirin, and a few bites. Pushing their plates to the side, Colt began, his hands folded on the table in mock business.

"On today's agenda: finally getting around to finding and killing the bastards who want to kill us."

"They were sent by Soldats."

"What makes you think that?" Colt taunted as he reached for another bottle of headache curatives.

"This has happened before. My master and I are from Soldats."

"Wow. I'm almost convinced by that bullshit, since you happen to utter the same name of my current employers. What did you do, piss off the men in charge one time too many?"

"I am True Noir. This is merely another test for me, sent by Altena." Chloe proudly said, like she was a 3rd grader announcing she made it into the Honor Role.

"As opposed to what? The assassins Noir here in Paris? Don't delude yourself. You're just a knife-wielding toy at this point."

In a moment, Chloe had reverted back into a fierce killer (and zealot, Colt realized), hissing. "You be quiet! You have no idea what Noir is about! What do you know about Soldats, or anything for that matter? You just kill for money!"

"I kill for money, because I feed myself." Colt sneered back, unaffected, "What about you? You just kill because your precious Altena tells you to. You're disposable."

"That's what Noir truly is! Soldat's weapon. The shining sword refined by Altena-"

Colt's tone became frozen, "Don't glorify weapons. They may shine and sparkle for all their worth, but in the end, they'll just get used up and thrown away. That's why I'm better than you. I'm fine by myself; I don't need to delude myself into needing anything. Once you do, you become a tool."

"And are you happy without any purpose except to serve money, all alone? Perhaps I'm a tool, but I have one thing you can't buy. Happiness. Altena gives me happiness. Seeing my friends gives me happiness. Does money make you happy?"

"Happiness is just a feeling. Money is what's real. Everything is for money. That's the only thing that matters to Man. Soldats, science, world war, or world peace. It's only for money."

There was silence from the opposite sides of the spectrums. Zealots and Atheists usually made light of each other, with nothing between.

Colt breathed in through the nose deeply, and took another bottle of aspirin, and was facing Chloe with an arrogant tone again. "Never the less, we need to eliminate whoever's in charge of the suits. If it's Soldats, I'll just kill them."

"Soldats can't be killed. The best you can do is to eliminate whoever directly ordered the assault. The higher ups in Soldats usually hand out orders and then forget about them. That's how they cover their tracks."

"Hmph. If that's what will get them to leave us alone, that's what I'll be fine with. Since they're looking for us, I'll send out a rumor and make a trap."

* * *

**666-Lives is sailing through a Storm. Pirates Unknown. Can anyone hand over a Treasure Map? Can pay in Silver.**

**-666-Lives**

_**Plea heard. Where can you make port?**_

_**-Faust Inc.**_

**Port can be made at PRIHIOSERABBLQUETLECIAENT. Possible to convene?**

**-666-Lives**

_**Can convene at 12820062400.**_

_**-Faust Inc.**_

* * *

"I believe you spelled "Library" in French wrong."

"Shut up."

* * *

Colt leafed through a few pages of _Don Quixote_ before sliding it back into the shelf and wheeling himself towards Chloe, who stood silent while taking in the strength of the quiet in the giant archives.

"So, what do you think Chloe? There's enough shelves in the place to break up the enemies, making it manageable for the two of us, even you can't hardly use one side of your body, and I can't climb stairs or shoot and move at the same time." Called out haughtily, enjoying the silence before the storm.

The library was a giant chamber, with large balconies built into the sides to hold more shelves. The placement of the shelves began with circles that made up the center of the maze, before breaking up into rows. If someone could take control of the upper floors, it would be a perfect site for a slaughter.

Colt was dressed in a wide-brimmed fedora tilted to a side, along with a shorter black jacket that his usual long coats since the last thing he needed was his jacket to snag on the wheels in a middle of a firefight. It still made his lower body feel naked.

When he first fought Chloe, she was wearing (very suitably) a tight dark body suit, her limbs reinforced by metal graces lined with blades, covered completely by a green cloak. The worn cloak was still there, but most everything else had gone, either by bullets or emergency surgery. She was borrowing a white blouse and slacks that were both far too large for her, even with all the excess fabric tied down by numerous belts and blade-holstered straps.

(Colt had joked how most women wearing men's clothing after sleeping over should comment how it "smells of him". She only got that she was supposed to be insulted. Consequentially, the sustained injuries were far more than it was supposed to.)

"Chloe?"

"Hmmm? Yes. This place is suitable for lower number to hold the advantage."

"You're going to have to be the one who locks the door behind them. I've got to hold the upper floors, since I'm the one who uses guns."

"You are sure they're going to come."

"Of course. Help comes out of the blue? Like I say, everything's just to jump in for the kill and make a profit. There's no such thing as real friends in this business. Of course, you're too stupid to realize that."

"Then why did you help me?"

"Because I couldn't walk out of there on my own, and you were too injured to treat it on your own. See? It's all for your own profit. Not because you felt out of your goodness of your heart to befriend to stupid, money loving killer."

"And now? What about now? Why haven't we killed each other yet?"

"Because we still can't fight them alone, you stupid girl! Believe me, this hasn't changed anything! When this is all over, I'll put a bullet in your brain and go about my way!"

"I'd like to see you try, you cripple."

"You'd be surprised what I can do."

There was silence for a while, as they sat away from each other, while waiting for midnight to come. The few noises only consisted of the popping of an opening and closing aspirin bottle. Chloe eventually spoke up.

"Jeremy?"

"Hmmm?"

"What made you want to go into killing?"

"…Where I'm from, going into the underworld was the safest place to be. I worked from the bottom, and made my way to the top. Simple as that."

"Did you ever want a normal life?"

"Sometimes. But it's too dangerous to go back now. I've got to keep this up." Colt spun his wheelchair around to turn and look at Chloe. "Why?"

"Oh. I just wanted to know. It's not very often I talk to other people of my profession."

"And what about you? Altena brainwash you or something?"

"No. Altena never had anything to do with it. I realized what I wanted to be when I was with my best friend."

"Oh?"

"She was ten then… she killed a family of traitors." Chloe sighed as she wistfully remembered, "It was just so beautiful… so perfect… she always did everything perfectly… and when she continued to kill, I knew I had to follow her. I had to protect her the best I could…"

"A knight for a princess?" Colt noted in a barking laugh. She didn't notice, lost in her memories.

"Now she isn't here anymore… it hurts so bad now… but Altena says she'll be back soon. I have to keep waiting…"

There were sounds of multiple vehicles coming to a stop outside the library. The two assassins turned their heads to the noise, before Colt jerked his head to Chloe, silently demanding her check. Even with her injuries, scaling the top of one of the shelves and bounding her way to one of the normally inaccessible ledge-lined windows was no trouble for her.

"Well?"

"There are at least four vans outside. Men with suits are coming out, and they're all carrying handguns or machine pistols. You were right this time, Colt."

"Of course!"

Chloe continued to spy, "They're trying to surround the buildings on all sides. A man in a blue suit and blonde hair is ordering them."

"Got it. I'll be upstairs. I trust you're a big enough girl to take care of yourself…" Colt said as he casually wheeled himself towards the service lift in the corner of the library.

* * *

As the power was cut, several men in suits barged through, armed with NVGs along with their guns. The Blue Suit in the lead swung out his arms.

"Spread out and find them!"

Silently moving around the paper and wood divisions, the men scanned the area, and were quick to find the silhouette of a cloaked figure darting past them, deeper into the library. Even though they opened fire, they could never catch the person. Deeper and deeper they chased, until quite suddenly, the found everybody else except the shadowy figure within the encircled center of the library, built with lounge seats and covered in moonlight.

"Where did she go?"

The Blue Suit felt something was off.

Up above, on the balcony, Colt dropped a 7.62mm GPMG onto the railing, belt already fed in. GPMG meant "General Purpose Machine Gun". It was more than enough for the likes of them.

Colt squinted through the sight.

_I don't need NVGs to see you guys…_

Within moments, everything in the center of the library disintegrated into little pieces of wood, paper shreds, plastic, cotton, blood, and flesh.

As men tried to regroup outside the circle of death, trying to find the source of the lead sword of death that was cleaving through the library, they were quickly hunted down from above, as a giant shadowy form flew above them, planting knives up to the hilt into their necks and chests.

In short, it was nothing short of a massacre.

* * *

They silently moved through the dark streets of Paris, Chloe quietly wheeling Colt from behind.

"Chloe. Leave Soldats and Altena."

"Why?"

"Your young. You have talent. It would make me sick to think you're just going to be disposed of when you've lost your usefulness to them, except I'm already sick from something else."

"I am the True Noir. I never will leave Altena… and… this is the only way I'll be able to get close to my friend…"

"Fuck them. Fuck them all. I told you, there's no such thing-"

"I DON'T CARE! I WON'T LEAVE THEM!" Chloe screamed into the back of Colt's head. He turned around glaring while reach out and grabbing her by the collar of her cloak and pulling her face-to-face. He didn't mind that her hands were meanwhile trying to break his wrist.

"You listen you stupid bitch! Killing for a cause? It's all a fairy tale! You honestly think there's any kind of pure intent in this world? You're just turning yourself into a puppet out of show! I know, because I was the same when I was your age! I spent the first twenty years of my life getting ready to save the world! But according to them, saving the world meant invading foreign countries for commercial profit! Everything is always for making money, you idiot! I told you! The sooner you care only about yourself, the sooner you become REAL!"

He shoved her away then, both of them panting, it all out in the open.

"That's the difference between real people and weapons. Weapons listen to fairy tales. Real people think only of making money." Colt concluded.

Chloe shook her head, "I don't want to be like you. Even with all the money, you still keep trying to prove you're human. I don't need to prove that to anybody."

"The only thing I need to prove is that I can stand by myself, without anyone telling me what I should be." Colt snorted.

The two of them stared at each other. Colt wheeled himself about and started rolling away.

"They're gone, Chloe. We don't need each other anymore. Go back to your fairy tale kingdom, and live out your fake story…"

* * *

Colt stepped onto the rocky cliff over looking the dry land.

He didn't know why he kept onto the insignificant memory. He didn't know why he always retold that story first when he told stories of his older jobs. He didn't know why he felt so shook up on the inside when he heard a bad rumor of a "True Noir". Didn't know why he wasted so many resources to find out who Altena was. Didn't know why, even when he was just recovering from being nearly beaten to death by a Gunslinger Girl, he scoured the French-Spanish border.

This wasn't the time to think. Colt leaned his head backwards to drink down the remainders of his aspirin bottle, before spitting it away, his arms waving in the air uselessly while they rested in splints and bandages

Down below he could see a vast mansion, endless vineyards, ancient pedestals, coliseums and labyrinths. Sounds of flying steel and gunfire, and a shrieking girl's anger.

He should have known he was right all long time ago. Chloe was going to make her fatal mistake any moment.

He saved her life once without his legs. He'd do it again without his arms.

Sliding down the cliff, Colt wondered why he was doing any of this. This was being a hero, saving a life, living a fairy tale and happy endings.

All he knew was, ever since that night, all the money in the world stopped making him happy.

* * *

**You can have your Sensations. All I want is Peace.**

**To Serve: End**

* * *

A/N: I love Chloe. I don't want her to die. That's why I'm off to save her life. I just like her too much.

Anyways, Fanon notes. I usually don't think of Fanon in terms of time-line, honestly. I usually thought it as things concepts existing at the same time. What if somebody wanted to do something, but couldn't because a Fanon timeline restricted it? Right now I think of the Fanon as in, "There are US units, Israeli Units, Italian Units, AND Soldats, Amalgam, Pandania, British Lirbrary, kNIGHTS, etc." That way, people can reference other stories without having to curb how they want their stories to be by trying to have it to adhere to how other people wrote the events.

If any of you get this, please say so. I might be spouting gibberish.


End file.
